It seems that Argentina is returning the favour to Spain by bringing to trial notorious Franco-regime torturers.
In the previous decade, Argentinean victims of the military junta’s excesses found it impossible to bring their tormentors to trial: they had to wait until Spain’s judicial ‘hero’ Baltazar Garzón extradited them to stand trial.
Now, Argentinean judges are returning the favour as they have requested theextradition of Franco-era torturers to Argentina to stand trial.
To nobody’s surprise, Spanish Government, in the hands of the country’s right-wing party, is not keen on cooperating.
The Argentinean judge, based in Buenos Aires, has issued an extradition request for four policemen and Guardia Civil officers under charges of Crimes Against Humanity. Amongst them, the most notorious, Juan Carlos González Pacheco, alias Billy el Niño.
One of his victims relates, “He was an animal, a savage that enjoyed hitting people. He was a corpulent man who beat me up insatiably.”
His worst encounter with this sadistic police inspector was when he hung him, head first, out of an upstairs window, threatening, “We’re going to let you drop, as we did with Julián Grimau.”
There was also 17-year-old María Rumin had been protesting with friends in 1975 in favour of free state schooling in Madrid. Amongst their number was an infiltrated spy from the Brigada Politico y Social; the feared secret police.
She was arrested and held for three days, beaten about the face and kicked repeatedly. Billy the Kid was asking the questions. She explained that it was written all over his face that he was enjoying it.
And the list goes on.
With the return to democracy, an amnesty was agreed between all parties so that people like Billy the Kid would never face trial, which is why until now he has never paid for his crimes. The Spanish Government claims that the amnesty law means that the men threatened with extradition cannot stand trial, but International Law overrides national amnesties.
Also on the extradition list is an ex-Minister under Franco, who is now in his late 80’s, José Utrera Molina and two Franco judges, Jésus Cejas Mohedano and Rafael Gómez Chaparro.
Against this background, the party Spokesman for the governing party, Rafael Hernando, made the astonishing comment on the right-wing debating program, El Cascabel al Gato on TV channel 13TV, that “The families of the victims of Franco only remember them when there is a hand out involved.”
Editorial comment: the Partido Popular rightly demands that the domestic terrorist group, ETA, apologises for the assassinations carried out over the last 40 years… yet they fail abysmally to condemn the post-war atrocities carried out by the Franco Regime up to 35 years ago. On top of that their top officials can come out with the above sort of comment.