Diplomats from the United States and the United Nations were present on this anniversary to express their solidarity with the search for justice for the 1,730 victims of this massacre perpetrated by the Salvadoran Army in 1981.
Forty years ago, the municipality of El Mozote, located in the northeast of Salvador, some 200 kilometers from the capital San Salvador, experienced an unprecedented massacre. This Saturday, December 11, the 1,730 victims left by that massacre of December 1981 were remembered.
“It’s as if it were yesterday. Our wounds are open, our hope is in justice,” said Dorila Márquez, 65, who lost her parents, a pregnant sister, six nephews and five brothers-in-law.
During this Saturday, in the Plaza de El Mozote, the commemorations were held. There was a minute’s silence, church bells rang and there were flower offerings at the monument dedicated to the victims.
“The massacre for us as victims is something that we cannot forget. Year after year we are in this place to remind them and tell them that their memory lives on,” said the president of the Association of Victims of El Mozote at the opening of the ceremony. , Leonel Tobar.
Between December 9 and 13, 1981, the Salvadoran Army, and specifically the counterinsurgent battalion Atlácatl -formed by the United States-, launched the so-called “Operation Rescue” against the population of the northeast of the department of Morazán. Children, men and women were “deliberately and systematically” tortured and executed, according to the United Nations Truth Commission Report.
In 2017, the Salvadoran government had established that at least 988 people (including 558 children) were killed in and around El Mozote, 48 survived the massacre.
The United Nations expresses once again its solidarity in the search for justice
The regional representative for Central America of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Alberto Brunori, also participated in the commemorations this Saturday, expressing his support on behalf of the UN to find justice for the families of the victims of this tragedy. .
“The promise is there. Breaking impunity over this and other serious human rights violations. That impunity that manifests itself as a constraint that limits the scope of peace, because we must recognize that peace is not only reached by silencing the weapons, but you also get there by the paths of justice, “Brunori declared.
Adding that this justice “must be independent, impartial, prompt and fulfilled. Prompt has not been in the case of El Mozote, but we trust that this is the case. “
The judicial process could restart
What worries the victims’ relatives the most is the departure of the judge in charge of the criminal proceedings against high-ranking military officials responsible for the massacre. Judge Jorge Guzmán was dismissed due to a reform of the law of the judicial career, which de facto pensions all judges in their sixties or with more than 30 years of service. The reform approved by the Legislative Assembly three months ago was signed by President Nayib Bukele and endorsed by the Supreme Court of Justice.
The criminal trial against retired soldiers including some of the military leadership of the time was about to start. Since 2016, when the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court annulled the amnesty law, the trial had progressed as never before, and 17 soldiers were indicted. But with the dismissal of Judge Guzmán, plus other obstacles in the process, everything is now paralyzed.
The new judge assigned is Mirtala Portillo and among the victims there are fears for the challenge that lies ahead.
Lawyer Alejandro Lenin, from the NGO Tutela Legal ‘María Julia Hernández’ – named after the human rights defender of El Salvador during the civil war – fears that everything will “start all over again.” “We would hope not and that the case continues from the last part (investigation stage) to enter a public hearing and its respective sentence,” he commented.
Lenin pointed out that in the complete file of the case there were “more than 36,000 pages with judicial pieces, evidence and expert opinions, and more than 50 statements.” Adding that he saw it “very complicated for the new judge to quickly update (the process) ”.
Portillo was appointed by the Supreme Court to lead the Investigative Court of the town of San Francisco Gotera (in the eastern part of the country), the court that presides over the criminal process of El Mozote.
The United States delivers declassified documents on the massacre
On Friday, December 10, the United States delivered declassified documents on the El Mozote massacre to the San Francisco Gotera court. These documents were “requested by the court in charge of the investigation. We will present more in the future, “clarified Brendan O’Brien, charge d’affaires of the US Embassy in a speech during the commemoration this Saturday.
The diplomat affirmed “ensuring that current and future generations have access to the historical records of what happened here in El Mozote is a key piece of that preservation effort” in what “was one of the darkest chapters in the history of El Savior”.
The defense attorney for the victims, David Morales, considered the declassification of information as “an important gesture” by the United States. Recalling that “the responsibility of the United States in the civil war was primarily in the republican administration of Ronald Reagan, which covered up the massacre and lied to Congress that it had conditioned military aid to respect for human rights.”
During the civil war that broke out in the country from 1979 to 1992, El Salvador registered more than 75,000 deaths, at least 7,000 disappeared, and thousands of displaced people. As a result of confrontations between the Salvadoran Army, financed by the United States, and the guerrillas of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, now an opposition political party.
With EFE and AFP
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