A former military officer accused of crimes against humanity during Argentina's 1976-1983 military dictatorship has defended the practice of snatching newborns from their illegal detainees and stealing their identities, saying it was a necessary act due to the "cursed blood" of their parents.
Alberto Daniel Rey Pardellas, who was a part of Communications Battalion 181 of Bahía Blanca and is accused of 90 cases of kidnapping and torture, one murder and three cases of grievous bodily harm, argued during a trial that the move was "humanitarian."
According to a reporting by journalist and Times contributor Luciana Bertoia, Rey Pardellas, 79, described the process of appropriating the children of the disappeared as a “humanitarian” act by kidnappers.
It’s commonplace in post-war left-wing rhetoric to say that there was no war but genocide, and that the appropriation of the children of terrorists was an abhorrent practice,” the repressor told the court.
“It is necessary to answer very clearly that each of the so-called ‘recovered grandchildren’ proves two things. Firstly, the humanitarian way those who made the children of terrorists – who, by the way, were awful parents – their own, assuming that then they would be prevented from growing up hating like their parents hated,” claimed the repressor, who is currently under house arrest.
When he spoke of recovered grandchildren, the accused made the typical gesture of air quotes, to relativise the concept.
He then said: “It has been proven that many of them, though not all, just like their parents, have their blood cursed.”
Citing cases for his remarks, Rey Pardellas highlighted former government officials who have recovered their identities, such as Juan Cabandié, of whom he remembered a street quarrel with a policeman over a traffic incident, and Eduardo 'Wado' De Pedro, today a deputy.
When the speech of the man accused of crimes against humanity continued to escalate, the judges from the Federal Court of Bahía Blanca – Sebastián Foglia, Marcos Aguerrido and Ernesto Sebastián – interrupted the witness and called order in the court.
The remarks offer a chilling insight into the psychological make-up of those who committed atrocities during the era of state terrorism.
– TIMES/NA
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