Argentina and Iran to investigate AMIA bombing

This is a significant move in Argentina: the government has reached an agreement with Iran to set up a truth commission to investigate the 1994 AMIA bombing. The commission will be made up of five independent judges, none of whom will be from either Argentina or Iran. Iran will now permit prosecutors to interrogate suspects in Tehran.

Amia bombing: Argentina and Iran agree truth commission (BBC)
Deal Reached for Inquiry on Bombing in Argentina (New York Times)
Argentina/Iran ‘Truth Commission’ to resolve 1994 bombing of Jewish centre in Buenos Aires (Mercopress)

Israel has condemned the decision. An Israeli spokesman said the move was tantamount to "inviting a murderer to investigate his own killings".

Amia bombing: Israel condemns Argentina-Iran probe (BBC)
Israel Rebukes Argentina for Deal With Iran to Investigate ’94 Attack (New York Times)

Argentine foreign minister Héctor Timerman has met with members of Jewish organizations and families of victims to discuss the plans.

Timerman meets with DAIA, AMIA and relatives of victims, rejects criticism (Buenos Aires Herald)

The Economist suggests that Argentina has "burnt bridges" with Israel over the agreement, which it sees as a further step in Christina Fernandez's "increasingly combative" foreign policy. Meanwhile, Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post says that the move is "disturbing" and predicts a "Mickey Mouse commission". La Nación also expresses scepticism in its editorial.

Here's Monday's cover of Pagina/12:

A dar respuestas ante la Justicia argentina (Pagina/12)


So that's a fair amount of criticism of the commission before it has even been formed. I agree with Boz that it's rash to prejudge. It would also be unwise to get one's hopes up too soon, but essentially, I think that barring all possibility of talking to Iran about anything gets you nowhere. We'll see how this develops.

Peru: Uchuraccay postscript

La Republica has an article about a group of journalists retracing the steps of the journalists who went to Uchuraccay in 1983. Just in case there was any doubt about the iconic value of the group photo of the men, check out the image chosen to illustrate the new story:

Destino Uchuraccay, 30 años después (La Republica)

Peru: 5 minutes with Vera Lentz

Here's a short interview with Peruvian photographer Vera Lentz talking about her work on the  Peruvian conflict (Spanish).

Peru: Remains of Chungui victims returned to families

A number of bodies of people killed in Chungui, Peru, around 1984-85 have been released for proper burial. Exhumation work has been going on for some time.

The exact number seems to be unclear - La Republica is reporting 78, Correo 54, news agency EFE 65, and Argentina's Pagina/12 78, but only 68 of them identified.

I have mentioned Chungui a couple of times before, in connection with the work of artist Edilberto Jimenez.

Entregan 78 cuerpos de víctimas de las FFAA y Sendero en Chungui (La Republica)
Ayacucho: Fiscalía entregó 54 restos de matanza de Chungui (Correo)
Los restos de 65 asesinados en el conflicto interno en Perú recién serán sepultados (EFE)
Después de años, velan a sus muertos (Pagina/12)

Image credit: European Pressphoto Agency.

Peru: 30th anniversary of Uchuraccay

It is now three decades since one of the emblematic events of the Peruvian conflict, the killing of eight journalists and their guide in Uchuraccay. Here's my original post on Uchuraccay from 2009.

Uchuraccay is one of those events where, 30 years on, the truth seems as out of reach as ever despite two investigations and innumerable newspaper articles, events, protests, appeals to court, etc.

It is also a very visual contribution to social memory. Here are three images:

This is the classic picture of the murdered journalists (with the exception of Octavio Infante, who took it). It captures the men on their way up the village, posing, apparently relaxed, it could a snapshot of a group of friends on a day out. Its power derives from our knowledge of what happened next, that these men were almost at the end of their lives.

 

This image was taken by Willy Retto at Uchuraccay, very shortly before he was killed, and discovered in a film shortly after the publication of the report produced by the commission led by Mario Vario Llosa. How many instances are there of people capturing the very moments before their own death? The power of this image is located in its presentness, frozen just before the crime. What it does not do is deliver us an awareness of "the truth" or "the facts of the case". Retto's images have been used to argue both for and against the presence of the armed forces in the village. 

This photograph comes from the online edition of La Republica, in an article headlined "They live on in the hearts of those who loved them". It shows Oscar Retto, Willy's father, holding a photograph of his son. Retto senior has spent long years battling for justice for his child and the other victims. Like relatives in many other countries and contexts, his symbol is the enlarged image of his missing son. Unlike the families of the disappeared, of course, he knows where his son is buried, but he cannot be sure of the precise circumstances of his death. The image brings together a number of symbols - the Christian cross, the cemetery, the photograph, the memorial - yet Oscar Retto is also in a posture of defiance, not bowed in mourning. Also a photojournalist, Retto senior is aged over 80, but like the Grandmothers in Argentina, his pain keeps him fighting.

Here's further reading: in particular, Juan Gargurevich's posts on his blog Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos are highly recommended for Spanish-speakers.

Uchuraccay: la pesadilla de Vargas Llosa (I) (Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos)
Uchuraccay, la pesadilla de Vargas Llosa (II) (Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos)
Uchuraccay, la pesadilla de Vargas Llosa (III) (Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos)
Uchuraccay, la pesadilla de Vargas Llosa (FINAL) (Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos)
-¿Qué escribió Vargas Llosa sobre Uchuraccay? (Periodismo, Periodistas, Periódicos)
Uchuraccay (IDL-Reporteros)
30 años de la matanza de Uchuraccay (el Popular)
Mártires de Uchuraccay en el recuerdo de todos (La Primera)
Masacre de periodistas es una herida abierta en Perú (AFP)
Viven en el corazón de los seres que amaron (La Republica)

Argentina: BBQ at the ESMA, anyone?

An odd scandal blew up in the first week of the year in Argentina. Justice minister Julio Alak was accused of taking part in an end-of-year barbecue on the site of the former ESMA clandestine detention centre. This was interpreted by some as a sign of disrespect for the victims disappeared at the site.

Alak has responded by denying that there was a barbecue, stating that there was an event organised by his ministry at which sandwiches were provided. He has also blamed the media for blowing the story out of proportion.

Madres' leader Hebe de Bonafini says that "anything" is allowed in the ESMA and has herself previously cooked there. On the other hand, the association of former disappeared people (AEDD) has criticised Alak and is organising a protest.

Pagina/12 has published an excellent article by Cecilia Sosa asking the questions which arise in this context:

What is a "space of memory"? What are the activities which it is possible to imagine in a site which is characterized by the unbearable? And further, is it possible to celebrate in a place of death?

Sosa recalls the work of Jens Andermann, who has identified three positions with respect to a place of memory like the ESMA: the "testimonial", which situates it as an unalterable place of witness to State Terrorism, the "museal", which focuses on the pedagogical function of the space, and the "performatic", which maintains that only by opening the space up to artistic and politic activities can it be taken back from death and the perpetrators.

Since the opening up of the ESMA in 2007, Sosa points out, the site has attempted to balance all three functions - human rights groups have offices there, there are guided tours, and there are concerts and lectures, among other things.

She concludes,

The future of the ex-ESMA has still not been discovered. The co-existence of distinct rituals suggests a different path to that taken by Auschwitz: a politics of pain which reveals its capacity for experimentation, where absences help to forge new links and where the past may live alongside a future to be invented. In this time to come, perhaps a barbecue for two thousand people or other types of celebration will not be so scandalous and will turn out to be a new way for people to be together in their loss. The table is laid. It's time to feed our guests. 

My gut reaction when I saw Tweets about the ESMA barbecue was "Really??". But reading this article reminded me of some of my usual understanding of memorials. I'm a great believer in using spaces of memory, not shutting them off from the rest of society. This was the problem with the Parque de la memoria when I was in Buenos Aires in 2004: far from the centre of the city and close to the (then-closed) ESMA, it was completely empty at the time I visited. Dead. What's the point of a park no one sits in, walks in, brings their kids to? It was also the problem with the Ojo que llora monument in Lima which, following vandalism, was shut behind a gate (I don't know if it's freely accessible right now, but the last I heard it wasn't).

No, I'm not suggesting a picnic in Auschwitz. I don't even know enough about Alak and the particular event he was attending to comment on whether or not it was "respectful enough" for the site. But I am still sure that I like to see places of memory woven into the fabric of the landscape and not preserved in aspic.

Apareció la foto del "asado" de Alak en la ex ESMA (Clarin)
Alak: "El asado en la ex ESMA es una absoluta mentira" (La Nacion)
Bonafini: en la ESMA "se puede hacer de todo" (Terra)
Crece el repudio al asado en la ESMA y convocan a una marcha (Clarin)
La mesa está servida (Pagina/12)

Peru: Memory museum nearly finished

Here's some progress to start the year: Fernando Carvallo, director of the Peruvian memory museum (now officially called the Lugar de la Memoria, la Tolerancia y la Inclusión Social), has announced that construction work will be completed on 15 January 2013. The shell of the four-storey building in Lima will then be finished and can be fitted out, a process which will take several months.

Work started back in November 2010 and has been partially financed by Germany.

The building will consist of a basement, an auditorium on the first floor, the exhibition about the violence of the 1980s and 1990s on the second and third floors, and a terrace on the fourth floor.

"Access to the second to fourth floors will take place via a ramp and the visit will go from bottom to top, upwards. The idea is that the visitor will feel that they are passing from darkness to light, from horror to the hope of reconciliation in a democratic society," explained Carvallo.


Anuncian que obras en el Lugar de la Memoria terminarán el 15 de enero (La Republica)