One day after Page 12 will publish that had been infiltrated in Mothers of Plaza de Mayo during the dictatorshipIsabelita resigned from her last position in the sphere of Argentine Federal Police (PFA). Despite having asked to be discharged from the Corps of Information in 2004, He had spent all these years training the new cadres of the force both at the Federal Intelligence School (EFI) and at the University Institute of the Argentine Federal Police (IUPFA).. The persistence in the structures of the forces of those who acted in the dictatorship shows the challenges that democracy still faces Argentina – which will be 40 years old next year.
Days ago, in the courts of Comodoro Py they received the file of Isabel Correa as a teacher at the PFA. The folder shows that the Bachelor of Science in Education began working as a teacher in 1995, when she was still reporting at the Department for the Protection of the Constitutional Order –better known as the POC–. The POC was created towards the end of 1983 and its first chief was Peter Santiago Godoysentenced as a torturer in the clandestine centers known as Atlético-Banco-Olimpo (ABO). In the first years of democracy –believe it or not–, they were in charge of the security of the judges who, among other things, had to investigate the crimes of the dictatorship. In 1994, the POC was involved in the investigation of the attack on the AMIA – and in the destruction of key evidence.
Throughout more than 25 years as a teacher at the PFA, Isabelita taught subjects such as Doctrinal Update and Political Trends, Meeting Methods and Procedures –which basically refers to how to obtain information–, Research and Analysis Methodology or Situational Analysis. He initially did it at the EFI – where became the head of studies– as in the IUPFA.
In 2013, the woman was denounced by the then Minister of Security Nilda Garré after the Special Documentary Survey Group (GERD) found in her file a record that she had been infiltrated in Madres during the dictatorship. In those years –particularly in 1981–, another former PFA agent Luis Alberto Martínez –known as “Japanese”– mentioned a woman named “Isabelita” as the person who was infiltrated in the group of Mothers and relatives that met in the Church of the Holy Cross. In her file it also appears that she had appeared in a complaint made in the international arena.
For 45 years, Isabelita never had to give explanations – she even continued to train the new generations of members of the PFA despite having been denounced for crimes against humanity and for her links with one of the most emblematic cases of repression: the disappearance of three Mothers of Plaza de Mayo and two French nuns.
“When massive human rights violations have been committed, The State has a series of obligations that go beyond prosecuting those responsible”, He tells her to Page 12 Fabián Salvioli, United Nations Special Rapporteur for Truth, Justice, Reparation and Guarantees of Non-Repetition. “One of the most important measures for the non-repetition of the facts is what is called the process of vettingWhat is it remove from State structures those who have been directly or indirectly involved in human rights violations”, he adds.
“If there is a plane in which I have detected in countries of all continents a strong resistance to carrying out this process, it is the field of security forces and intelligence services because esprit de corps makes it very difficult to carry out that task. That creates many problems. In the case of Chile, it is evident: despite the fact that the country became democratized, the security forces reacted in the repression of the protests two years ago with the same ways that the (Augusto) Pinochet police reacted”, exemplifies the official. of United Nations. “If you have a person who could have committed crimes in the performance of his task and then is responsible for training those who are going to carry out security tasks and work, the result is pathetic”highlights Salvioli.
The Information Corps to which Isabelita belonged is one of the least known and least investigated intelligence agencies. He is the same one who joined José Pérez –Iosi, the spy who was infiltrated in the Jewish community– or Américo Balbuena, the spy who was involved in the Walsh Agency. has not been declassified information beyond what has been sent to specific legal cases. “The countries, after a number of years, do not have any serious reason that prevents them from declassifying that information. Not proceeding with the declassification, the only thing that ends up generating is the impunity of these people, so, in that case, the State is failing to comply by omission”Salvioli points out.
“The seriousness of this situation is not this woman in particular, but that this training institute continues to function in this way. She can be the testimony of the continuity of a police model that is not compatible with democracy. In democracy, our daily struggle is to discredit violence and that this place is finally occupied by the rule of law”, he says. Jorge Autformer head of the Office of the Prosecutor for Crimes Against Humanity (PCCH).
for the sociologist Daniel Fearstein, the focus should be on the lack of real changes in the security forces in recent decades. “It is naked that there have been no reforms in the security forces during all these years of democracy. The formation of the forces is not resolved with the introduction of a matter of human rights. It is a cosmetic measure that does not deal with the underlying problem, which are the curricula, the teachers and the functioning of these bodies.”, says the director of the Center for Genocide Studies (CEG) of the National University of Tres de Febrero (UNTreF).
“We always denounce that those who acted in the dictatorship continued to be part of the repressive apparatus of the State and to train the new generations”contributes the deputy of the Front of the Left and Workers – Unity (FIT-U) Myriam Bregman. “That is clearly seen in the case of Isabelita, but it is not only that: the political content of the persecution carried out by the Information Corps of the PFA can be seen. That’s why, We have always demanded – and now we do it from the National Congress with a bill – that this body be dissolved”, insiste Bregman.
During Sabina Frederic’s administration at the head of Security, work was carried out on a proposal to reform the PFA in its entirety – which included the Information Corps – but it was never made public. In catholes there is also the reform of the Intelligence Law in which Cristina Caamaño focused together with a group of specialists.
“The Information Corps has a vice of origin: it’s totally secret”says Paula Litvachky, Executive Director of the Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS). “Since information was never declassified, these things can happen, such as a person who could have been involved in crimes against humanity continuing to teach classes because nobody knows who he is. They never finished discussing what to do with the Corps of Information”, she remarks.
Litvachky, who is one of the experts who studies the relationship between intelligence and the justice system, will be present on October 13 and 14 in Montevideo, when the Inter-American Court of Human Rights will analyze the request for Active Memory to condemn the Argentine State for its role against the AMIA bombing. “In those hearings We are going to discuss the weight of secrecy in the intervention of agents of the Information Corps and the impossibility of reconstructing the truth after all these years”, forward. It is a debate that Argentina has had for decades.