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Body found in icy river could sway Argentina’s midterm elections
Tests confirm body is Santiago Maldonado, an activist missing since a security forces raid in August.
A body found floating in the icy waters of a southern Argentina river could determine the result of midterm elections seen as vital for the right-of-centre president, Mauricio Macri.
The body is that of missing backpacker Santiago Maldonado, whose disappearance 81 days ago caused a political storm as the president seeks a vote of confidence on Sunday to continue his economic austerity programme.
An attempt by Macri to defuse the anger directed at his government for its mishandling of the disappearance backfired horribly after Macri called the mother of the now confirmed dead 28-year-old backpacker on Friday evening to offer his condolences.
“Mauricio Macri is a hypocrite, calling my mother two days before the elections,” Maldonado’s older brother Sergio said in a television interview after the presidential call, saying Macri had called from an private “unknown” number so his mother was not able to screen the call. Sergio also accused the government of hindering the investigation into his brother’s disappearance and of not having contacted his family before. “They should show more respect and not be so hypocritical and such trash,” he said.
Santiago Maldonado’s body was found on Wednesday floating in a river that meanders through land owned by the Italian fashion giant Benetton, close to where the backpacker was last seen on 1 August during a raid by security forces on a protest camp set up by indigenous rights activists on land claimed by the Mapuche people.
Investigators hope an autopsy now under way will provide clues as to whether the body had been in the water since 1 August which would suggest Maldonado drowned in the river trying to escape arrest, or whether it was thrown into the water later, which would support allegations that he was killed by security forces who later attempted to cover up their crime.
Maldonado’s disappearance has taken on a grim resonance in a country where thousands of young activists vanished in the custody of the security forces during the bloody 1976-83 dictatorship.
Tensions around the case are so high that Argentina’s major political parties immediately suspended their electoral campaigns following the discovery of the body on Wednesday.
Even football legend Diego Maradona has blamed the president for Maldonado’s disappearance, recording a brief video that quickly went viral last month saying: “Macri, free Maldonado!”
“The Maldonado case exploded in the hands of President Macri,” said Mariela Belski, president of the Argentinian chapter of Amnesty International, who has been highly critical of the government’s response to the disappearance.
Since August, social media has been dominated by photos of Maldonado, whose piercing gaze and long dreadlocks have become instantly recognisable. But with confirmation of his death, those photos are now inscribed on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram with messages such as “The government is responsible,” “Infinite pain” and “Justice for Santiago”.
“The family is angry and it’s understandable,” justice minister Germán Garavano said in a television interview on Friday.
Macri’s government at first tried to pin blame for Maldonado’s disappearance on Mapuche activists. The security minister, Patricia Bullrich, has been the subject of intense criticism, first for attempting to blame the disappearance on the protesters and then for allowing the investigation to be led by the national gendarmerie, the security force that raided the Mapuche camp.
A snap survey by Macri’s party, reported by the Clarín newspaper on Thursday, showed 40% of respondents feel the discovery of the body will benefit the opposition in Sunday’s congressional elections, with only 35% saying it benefits the government.
The decision of Macri’s PRO (Republican Proposal) political party to suspend its electoral rallies followed unsympathetic comments by its congressional candidate Elisa Carrió.
Told during a live television interview that the frozen body might be well-preserved even two months after Maldonado’s disappearance, she replied “Like Walt Disney”, in an apparent reference to the urban myth that the cartoonist was cryogenically preserved after his death.
Her comment was widely criticised on social media, and Carrió was ordered by her party to suspend a series of planned media interviews.
Maldonado’s family has also expressed deep mistrust for the government; relatives rushed to the spot where the body was found on Wednesday and have since then refused to let it out of their sight.
“Nobody could shake out of our heads the idea that much more could have been done much earlier,” said the family in a statement Friday evening. “The national government’s negative response to the offer of collaboration by UN experts remains unexplainable to us.”
“We don’t trust anybody,” Sergio Maldonado said on Thursday.
The case has even overshadowed former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s attempt to relaunch herself on to the political stage. Fernández is challenging Macri’s former education minister Esteban Bullrich for a senate seat in Buenos Aires, and has taken up Maldonado’s disappearance as an electoral cudgel with which to beat the government.
Up until the appearance of the body on Wednesday, Bullrich led the former president by between two and four percentage points. But the new survey revealed 12% of people have decided to change their vote following the appearance of the body.
Uki Goñi in Buenos Aires
* The Guardian. Saturday 21 October 2017 02.02 BST First published on Friday 20 October 2017 09.00 BST:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/20/body-found-in-icy-river-could-sway-argentinas-midterm-elections
Family of Santiago Maldonado Questions President Macri’s Silence for Nearly 80 days
Santiago vanished in August after a confrontation with security forces at a protest in Patagonia supporting the Indigenous Mapuche community’s land dispute.
The family of Santiago Maldonado, an activist whose body was found in the Chubut River earlier this week, have released a statement questioning the Argentine President Mauricio Macri’s silence for the past two months.
The family confirmed that Macri had spoken on the phone with the young activist’s mother, after his remains had been identified.
“Beyond the inopportune moment chosen for his first call, after a silence of almost 80 days, it is important that the president assume that our only objective is to achieve justice for Santiago,” the statement said.
The family also demanded that the Security Minister Patricia Bullrich explain in detail the police operation carried out on the day when he disappeared.
Santiago vanished in August after a confrontation with security forces at a protest in Patagonia supporting the Indigenous Mapuche community’s land dispute.
The statement also requested the intervention of the International Group of Independent Experts.
“#JusticeforSantiago | Santiago Maldonado’s family recognized the tattoos on the body found in the Chubut River and state that #ItIsSantiago”
They family added that “Santiago has been the victim of violent action that triggered his death, so we must continue waiting for the conclusive results of the experts, ensuring that their work is done without any pressure.”
“The attempt to discredit the investigation is a new affront to our pain, violates the prudence and respect demanded by the family,” the statement adds, asking the country’s political leadership along with the Argentine media and society to stand in solidarity with them until the truth is known and justice is done.
Earlier, the Inter-Amercian Commission on Human Rights, IACHR, had echoed the same, saying that the discovery of the Maldonado’s body does not rule out the possibility that he was the victim of a forced disappearance.
Interviewed by FM’s Diario de Futuro program, The Patriada, Esmeralda Arosemena, the IACHR’s Vice President, highlighted the responsibilities of the State and Justice over his death and warned about the risk of “non-transparent management” during the investigation.
Arosemena said “the appearance of a body does not rule out that it could be a forced disappearance.”
She emphasized “the importance of the immediate investigation to determine the causes of death” and called for the probe to be implemented with “speed, transparency and, above all, no impunity.”
The Federal judge Gustavo Lleral said the results of the autopsy carried out on the body on Friday showed no signs of injury, “We had a long day of work. Fifty-five people were in the room taking part in the autopsy and there were another 30 outside the room.”
Lleral told reporters, “It was possible to establish that there were no wounds on the body.” The forensic team also established that the remains were Santiago’s.
He said the cause of death is not known yet but should be established within about two weeks and he called for respect for Santiago’s grieving relatives.
The Maldonado family had released an earlier statement which said there are still many doubts about the case and expressing their hope that Lleral will advance in investigations without pressure, “We still find the National Government’s refusal of the offer to collaborate with UN experts inexcusable.”
It added, “We need to know what happened to Santiago and who is responsible for his death...everyone...not only those who took his life but those who, by action or omission, collaborated in covering up and hurting the search process.”
The head of the United Nations human rights office for Latin America, Amerigo Incalcaterra, has also called for a thorough investigation.
Telesur
Communiqué and Press Conference of Santiago Maldonado’s family
Communiqué of the family of Santiago Maldonado upon the apparition of the unidentified corpse in Chubut River on October 17 :
“In relation to the corpse found on Tuesday 17 in the Pu Lof Cushamen Community, the family of Santiago Maldonado wants to highlight that the discovery was made in a zone that was searched 3 times.
Until the realization of the forensic expertises it is not possible to determine the identity of the corpse nor the causes of death.
We demand respect for the difficult times we are living.
Thank You”
The mobilization convoked for past Wednesday 18 was cancelled due to a request of Maldonado’s family:
“Finally, after a request of Santiago Maldonado’s family, the Memory, Truth and Justice Encounter, integrated by several left organizations, Correpi, the Association of former Missing Detainees, among others, decided to cancel the march towards Plaza de Mayo that was convoked after the finding of a corpse in Chubut River for this Wednesday”
From Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo, HIJOS (Children of Plaza de Mayo) and APDH (Permanent Assembly for Human RIghts) there were communiqués in which they asked for prudence and calm. “The Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo accompany Santiago Maldonado’s family in this moment of such grief and ask for caution with the treatment of information. Also, we want to inform that our organization didn’t call for a March in this afternoon”.
Mapuche Spokeswoman: The corpse found in the river was “planted”
“Three days ago, it wasn’t there”. Ariel Garzi, friend of Santiago and witness in the case, stated the same thing.
In declarations to Rivadavia Radio, Maicoño added that “two or three days ago, the corpse wasn’t there, it was definitively not there”, and said that “it would have been seen since it is a pretty beaten path, because water is fetched from the river continuously”
At the same time, Ariel Garzi -a protected witness of the cause and friend of Maldonado- said that “if this is Santiago’s corpse, the impression we have is that it was planted”.
“It seems illogical that they found it now after so many searches. It is the only way they have to get rid of this problematic of a missing person in democracy, while cleaning the complicity of Gendarmerie, judge Otranto, attorney Avila and Patricia Bullrich”, he added.
Sergio Maldonado (Santiago’s brother): “I am going to keep searching until I’m 100% sure that we are talking about Santiago’s corpse, ”
Sergio Maldonado, along his lawyer Veronica Heredia and the expert witness, realized a press conference after the apparition of a corpse in the Chubut River. “Until now we can’t confirm if it is Santiago or if it isn’t”. He remarked that “I can’t say if he is, because I can’t identify him”. “Until I don’t have the 100% certainty that we are talking about Santiago’s corpse, I am going to keep searching” he emphasized.
“We can’t confirm if it is Santiago’s corpse. The harassment received from all of you, journalists, has been intense, and I believe you can wait a little and inform well. And not inform things or posting pictures that hurt. My parents are now 2000 kilometers away. I believe it doesn’t correspond. We have to rethink how you have carried this case through, anxiety is harmful for all of us”, said Sergio Maldonado.
“The journalistic profession must be rethinked. We are human beings. If you don’t have news to post, you can play music. It is pretty weird that a corpse appeared there. We have to be careful and demand time to state the news as they should. We want to know the truth and demand patience. There is still a possibility for him to be alive.” said Sergio Maldonado.
When asked if representatives of the national government had made contact with them, he replied: “They tried to contact Andrea, but 79 days after his disapparition, I believe it was something to be done at the first moment. Now, we don’t want any kind of dialogue”.
Maldonado’s family also questioned the sayings of the Cambiemos referent, Elisa Carrió, who recently assured, that there was “ a 20% possibility” that Maldonado was in Chile, and compared the state of the corpse found in the Chubut river with Walt Disney.
“She can not say that nonsense, is complete lack of respect. We know that there is a lot of people that doesn’t support Carrio’s sayings, but others did. They may not agree with Santiago activities, but it is a complete lack of respect.”
When asked for his opinion on the theory of the “planted” body , Sergio answered: “I can not assure it, but intuitively, I believe that it was planted”
“It was really hard being 7 or 8 hours with the body, even though it was floating; we had to live with it”.
This is the last known photograph taken of Santiago Maldonado -the man on the left with the blue jacket-. This picture was hidden by the Argentinian State since it confirmed the testimony of a Mapuche witness on what had happened the day of Gendarmerie’s irruption at the Mapuche community and the last day Santiago was seen. Photo taken by: Argentinian Gendarmerie. Leaked by: Pagina 12
Santiago’s sister-in-law, Andrea Antico, expressed: “We trust nobody, that is why we were until today next to the body so that nobody could touch it. Since day one, everything has been lies and harassment.”
Antico also affirmed: “We will wait until the results of the DNA test and the autopsy”.
Alejandro Incháurregui, the expert convoked by the family that carried the corpse ou of the river, also talked: “The presence of personal effects in the corpse’s clothes, the ID card among them, doesn’t imply a positive identification. There is no identification whatsoever. The body shall be analyzed in the next days at Buenos Aires”.
The first one to talk was the lawyer of the family, Veronica Heredia: “We are escorting Sergio and Andrea in a very painful moment. Our chosen expert is also here”.
“Yesterday at 11 in the morning a search was done in the Chubut river in a sector that had 3 previous searches. There is a record of this, the same search was made on August 5, September 8, and September 18. Everybody remembers the quantity of people and the deployment made in the same sector of the river on September 18, with a negative result.”
“The corpse was found at 11.40. From that moment on, the judge informed Sergio about the finding. There is no explanation for the founding to happen now and not in the previous searches. The location where it was found is absurd, ridiculous”.
“We have no explanations. To get them, first we must wait for the result of the autopsy and then we must continue by understanding all the evidence we had prior to this event and the new evidence that will appear”.
Then, Mario Coriolano, the defender before the Cassation Court of the Buenos Aires province, talked and provided details on what happened yesterday in Esquel after the discovery: “The family communicated with me so that the expert Inchaurregui could be present at the location, since the judge had informed me that the corpse couldn’t be touched until his arrival. After that I communicated with the minister Garavano”, he sustained.
On Wednesday 18, the family of Santiago Maldonado (28 years old), started the press conference from the Patagonian University in Esquel at 8 pm. The lawyer Verónica Heredia insisted: “There is no explanation on why the rest of the searches had negative results. No physical or juridic explanation”.
“The identity of the corpse is to be confirmed. We are not talking about death. We are talking about a forced disapparition with the participation of State forces like Gendarmerie.
Argentinian Government Concerned About Electoral Impact of Santiago Maldonado Case / Social Organizations March to Demand Justice
After the discovery of a body in the location where Santiago Maldonado was last seen, and only four days away from the national legislative elections, Mauricio Macri’s government is taking measures to assess and minimize the impact of this case on their electoral chances.
78 days after Santiago Maldonado’s disappearance, a male body was discovered by a search patrol in the Chubut river, in the location where he was last seen. Although the body’s identity will only be known next week, after DNA tests are performed, there is strong suspicion that it might be him, and if it is, the next question is: who or what killed him?
However, this discovery has already changed the agenda of all political parties for the elections, especially for the Cambiemos coalition, currently in power. While the center-left to left wing opposition has been denouncing the forced disappearance of Maldonado by the state since October 1, the Cambiemos coalition, especially Mauricio Macri’s own party, PRO, has alternated between silence and questioning the veracity of the publicly-known facts, for example suggesting the activist might have simply continued his travels incognito.
If the body is confirmed to be Santiago Maldonado, the government hopes to prove he died accidentally by drowning in the Chubut river—although many journalists and human rights organizations have noted the river is very shallow and with a weak current—or that the mapuche natives that Santiago Maldonado was helping in their struggle for territorial rights were the authors of his death.
Meanwhile, Kirchnerism and the left, as well as human rights organizations, claim Gendarmerie officers kidnapped the young man, killed him, and now planted his body in the area, and expect to prove the existence of signs of violence in the body.
Most parties made changes to their campaign activities after the news. President Mauricio Macri and Buenos Aires governor María Eugenia Vidal suspended their last campaign act. Macri encouraged his officials to have “more caution” when making declarations on the case and ordered them to wait until the Justice makes a pronouncement on the identity of the body found in the Chubut river.
While Santiago Maldonado’s family was giving a press conference to the headline-hungry media outlets and millions of expectant Argentinians listened to their words, the government launched a small poll. They called the houses of 1,200 people of the Buenos Aires province. An automated voice asked the following questions:
“Who did you vote in the runoff elections?”
“Who are you going to vote in the general elections?”
“In the event that the body in the river [sic] is Santiago Maldonado’s, who do you hold accountable?” Options were: the government, the Justice system, Patricia Bullrich, Gendarmerie, or the mapuches [sic]
“What’s your opinion on the “pact of silence”?” [the silence of the Gendarmerie agents that were involved in the case]
“To what extent do the latest news [the finding of the body] affect the national government?”
“Do you believe Patricia Bullrich should resign?”
Margarita Stolbizer, candidate for party 1País, criticized the telephone poll to measure the influence of the case in Sunday’s elections and affirmed that “the electoral impact of the Maldonado case is the only thing that matters to the government”, and that this is “shameful”. In a press conference, she expressed that during the last two months “the government drew us further from the possibility of finding out the truth and didn’t face the situation. They are not committed to life nor human rights”.
Meanwhile, the governor of Buenos Aires, María Eugenia Vidal, of the PRO party, said “this is an end of campaign that we had rather not happen”, and added that the case “is still not clear” in an interview in Radio Mitre.
Social and Human Rights Organizations Marched to Plaza de Mayo to Demand Justice for Santiago Maldonado
On Thursday, social and human rights organizations convened a march to Plaza de Mayo, outside the House of Government, to claim for justice.
[Many pictures are not reproduced here.]
Santiago Maldonado: missing backpacker takes center stage in Argentina’s elections
The case has revived memories of forced disappearances in the country – and become a rallying cry for President Mauricio Macri’s top opponent.
The last time anyone saw Santiago Maldonado was on the banks of an icy Patagonian river, where he was reportedly surrendering to Argentinian border guards during a raid on a camp of indigenous protesters.
Officers from the Argentinian national gendarmarie attacked the encampment on 1 August, in an attempt dislodge a group of activists who had occupied part of an enormous swath of land owned by the clothing empire Benetton, but also claimed by the region’s Mapuche people.
Witnesses saw Maldonado flee to the side of the frozen Chubut river – then turn back and surrender to the baton-wielding officers.
Since that day, more than two months ago, the 28-year-old backpacker has not been seen or heard of.
His disappearance has dominated nightly TV news, prompted a string of angry street protests – and revived bitter memories of Argentina’s 1976-83 military dictatorship, when 30,000 people were forcibly disappeared after being seized by security forces.
But it has also sparked a political firestorm before midterm elections on 22 October.
Photos of Maldonado’s bearded, handsome face have been reproduced endlessly on social media above the simple question: “Where is Santiago Maldonado?”
At a huge demonstration in Buenos Aires on Sunday, Maldonado’s brother Germán addressed the crowd flanked by the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo – the human rights campaigners who braved the dictatorship in their battle for justice.
“What is happening with human rights in this society is shameful,” he said. “We are stepping backwards in time.”
The disappearance has put pressure on the centre-right government of President Mauricio Macri, which has repeatedly tried to downplay the crimes of Argentina’s dictatorship.
The case has been adopted as a rallying cry by Macri’s main political opponent, the former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who is competing for a senate seat in the October vote – and who is widely thought to be eyeing a return to the presidency in 2019.
But Maldonado, a fine arts graduate and tattoo artist, was not a political figure, a third brother, Sergio, told the Guardian. “My brother’s not an activist, he’s a nomad, he writes poetry,” he said.
Santiago spent the last seven years crisscrossing Argentina with little but a backpack, and arrived at the remote Mapuche camp at the end of July.
The landscape around Pu Lof is a heart-stopping, barren wilderness where the endless plains of the Patagonian steppe are framed by the majestic Andes mountains.
But the area has become the setting for a long-running dispute between Benetton, the Italian clothing retailer, which owns 2.2m acres of land, and the Mapuche indigenous people, who claim a small part of the territory as their own.
Argentinian security forces have repeatedly faced accusations of excessive force during clashes with the protesters, who have staged land invasions and blocked roads.
When gendarmes in riot gear attacked the Pu Lof protest camp on 1 August, the indigenous activists dived into the Chubut river to escape the officers, but Maldonado hesitated at the edge of its cold waters.
“My brother can’t swim so he probably thought, ‘I’m white, I haven’t done anything,’ and gave himself up,” said Sergio.
According to Mapuche witnesses, Maldonado was heard telling the officers: “Please stop hitting me, I already surrendered.” Since then, there has been no trace of him.
Rather than investigate the officers involved, Argentina’s security minister, Patricia Bullrich, at first tried to cast suspicion on the protesters, suggesting in congress that Maldonado had been knifed by a Mapuche activist.
In turn, Fernández has repeatedly criticised the government for its handling of the case, accusing the government and sympathetic media of a cover-up.
Maldonado’s disappearance. Photograph: Bloomberg/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Officials have said that the case is being investigated as a forced disappearance, but human rights activists are scathing in their assessment of the official response.
“The government did everything wrong,” said Mariela Belski, the head of Amnesty International in Argentina. “The gendarmes should never have been allowed to investigate the scene.”
José Miguel Vivanco, the executive director of the Americas division of Human Rights Watch, said in a statement that the Argentinian government should prioritize the investigation.
“When someone goes missing, no matter under which circumstances, time is of the essence. This is all the more important when the person may have been forcibly disappeared by security forces,” he wrote.
But the case has also been seized on by Argentina’s far right, who have drawn a parallel between the current struggle for the rights of indigenous people and the activities of the leftwing guerrilla groups that were crushed during the dictatorship.
Alfredo Astiz, a formal naval officer who is already serving a life sentence for crimes including the murder of two French nuns, shocked the country with a statement in court this week in which he described the Mapuche protesters as a “secessionist movement” seeking to carve up the country.
“The war against terrorism can’t be won. It is a war without time,” said Astiz, who is currently being tried on a string of charges related to other crimes committed at the notorious Esma naval unit, where about 5,000 dissidents were held and tortured.
Meanwhile, the Maldonado family has not received any phone call or public expression of concern from Macri or any other high-ranking government official, while the judicial investigation into his case has not produced any discernible leads.
“The mistreatment of the family by the government is astonishing,” said Belski, of Amnesty Argentina. “That doesn’t mean that the family hasn’t been used politically, but that is ultimately irrelevant. What we have here is a missing person who must be found.”
Uki Goñi in Buenos Aires
* The Guardian. Friday 6 October 2017 08.00 BST Last modified on Friday 6 October 2017 14.38 BST:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/06/santiago-maldonado-argentina-election-missing-backpacker
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