Monday 05 January
2009, San José, Costa
Rica
RIGHTS-EL SALVADOR:
Impunity Defies
Inter-American Court
By Raúl Gutiérrez
SAN SALVADOR (IPS)
- The Inter-American
Court of Human Rights
ordered the Salvadoran
state to fully comply
with its sentence in the
case of the murder of
businessman Mauricio
García Prieto, and to
put an end to threats
and harassment of the
victim’s parents by
government agents.
The decision was handed
down in response to the
Salvadoran government’s
advisory opinion request
filed in March to seek
an "interpretation" of
the Inter-American Court
December 2007 ruling
that says the state
should conclude the
pending investigations
into García Prieto’s
homicide.
The Court said the
investigations must be
completed regardless of
whether the statute of
limitations on the
murder has expired or
the fact that El
Salvador did not accept
the competence of the
Court until 1995, a year
after García Prieto was
killed.
Guadalupe de Espinoza, a
lawyer with the Human
Rights Institute at the
University of Central
America (IDHUCA) who is
heading the process,
explained that the Court
reiterated its December
2007 verdict, which was
not on the June 1994
murder, but referred to
the lack of justice in
the case and the threats
and attacks suffered by
José Mauricio and Gloria
de García Prieto, the
victim’s parents.
Under Salvadoran law,
the statute of
limitations runs out on
a murder charge after 10
years.
On Jun. 10, 1994,
Mauricio García Prieto,
his wife and their
five-month-old son were
intercepted by two
masked men outside of a
relative’s house, one of
whom shouted "We’ve come
to kill you,
son-of-a-bitch!" before
shooting the businessman
at point-blank range,
according to witness
testimony.
Human rights advocates
and the García Prieto
family said at the time
that the murder was
linked to a rash of
death squad killings of
former commanders of the
leftist Farabundo Marti
National Liberation
Front (FMLN), which had
recently become a legal
political party.
The FMLN guerrillas
demobilised after a 1992
peace agreement put an
end to El Salvador’s
12-year civil war.
Far-right death squads
are blamed for the
majority of the 75,000
killings and 8,000
forced disappearances
committed during the
armed conflict.
After the murder, the
wealthy García Prieto
family was in constant
contact with police
chiefs and prosecutors,
but failed to obtain a
satisfactory response
about the progress of
the investigation, which
they say was marred by
irregularities and
served as a cover-up for
those who ordered the
killing.
Although two people are
in prison for carrying
out the murder, those
who planned and ordered
the killing have never
been identified.
A few months after the
murder, the victim’s
parents began to receive
threatening telephone
calls, and noticed they
were being followed.
Gloria de García Prieto
alleged several years
after the murder that a
former army general was
one of those who ordered
her son killed, but
conclusive evidence has
not been found.
After the Inter-American
Court handed down its
initial ruling in
December 2007, lawyer
David Morales, who was
working in the Human
Rights Ombudsperson’s
Office (PDDH) at the
time of the murder and
led the investigation,
said his office had
concluded that García
Prieto may have been
killed by a death squad
made up of members of
the dismantled security
forces who were
purposely embedded in
the National Civil
Police (PNC) when it was
created in 1993.
"Several police chiefs
tried to hinder the
investigation," said
Morales, who also
represented the
plaintiffs in the case
against El Salvador
being heard by the
Inter-American
Commission on Human
Rights in Washington,
involving the 1980
assassination of
Archbishop Óscar Arnulfo
Romero by far-right
paramilitaries.
De Espinoza told IPS
that the state has not
complied with any of the
verdict’s three points,
but that the Human
Rights Institute would
press forward, to get
the Salvadoran justice
system to fully fulfill
the sentence.
"The most important part
of the sentence, without
downplaying the rest, is
for those responsible
for the murder and the
attacks on the victim’s
parents to be brought to
trial," said de
Espinoza, who is also
the assistant director
of IDHUCA.
"Until those responsible
for the crimes are
punished, there will be
no justice," she said.
The recent Court
sentence, issued in late
November, stipulates
that the Salvadoran
government must
compensate the victim’s
family for the legal
costs incurred, and
provide them with
medical and
psychological
assistance. It also says
the García Prieto
family, members of
IDHUCA and experts
working on the case must
be provided with
protection according to
the terms specified by
the Court, and not as
the government deems
best.
In addition, the
sentence must be
published in the
Official Gazette and at
least one other national
media outlet, said the
Court.
The second sentence "is
highly significant for
Salvadoran justice" and
is "a reference point
for the fight against
impunity," said the
victim’s mother.
This is the second
ruling against El
Salvador handed down by
the Inter-American
Court. The first was
issued in March 2005 and
involved the failure to
bring to justice those
responsible for the
forced disappearance of
two sisters,
three-year-old Ernestina
and seven-year-old
Erlinda Serrano, at the
hands of the army during
a military
counterinsurgency
operation in 1982.
Human Rights Ombudsman
Óscar Luna told IPS that
in his annual report, he
describes a
deterioration of basic
rights in 2008.
Of 2,485 complaints
filed with his office,
1,603 are blamed on the
National Civil Police.
Among the most frequent
charges against them are
violations of individual
security, excessive use
of force and coercion.
"The fact that the PNC
is the most frequent
target of complaints is
disturbing," because it
implies that the
security of citizens is
undermined by those who
have the duty to protect
them, said the official.
Gloria de García Prieto
said the bugging of the
family’s telephones and
the harassment continue,
although in a more
sophisticated manner.
She clarified that they
have not accepted the
conditions in which the
state has offered them
protection because they
found out that the
agents "who supposedly
would protect us were
spying on us.
"They would come to our
house just to listen to
our conversations and
identify who was
visiting us. They were
like the Trojan horse.
"How can we trust agents
of the state if they are
the ones who killed my
son?" she asked. |
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