Argentina media heirs take DNA test in Dirty War abduction row

Argentina media heirs take DNA test in Dirty War abduction row
The heirs to Argentina's most powerful media empire have been ordered to take DNA tests that could establish if they were the offspring of a forced adoption scheme during the country's darkest era.

By Tom Leonard in New York and Edward Owen in Madrid
Published: 10:11PM GMT 30 Dec 2009



Felipe Noble, left, and Marcela Noble, the adopted children of Ernestina
Herrera de Noble leave a medical center after taking DNA tests Photo: EPA

Human rights campaigners claim the real parents of Marcela and Felipe Noble Herrera, whose mother controls the country's biggest newspaper, were abducted and murdered by the last dictatorship during its "Dirty War" against Left-wing dissidents.

The pair were adopted in 1976 by Ernestina Herrera de Noble, the director of Grupo Clarin, Argentina's dominant media group.

Mrs Herrera de Noble - whose late husband Roberto Noble set up Clarin, Latin America's biggest-selling newspaper - claimed the babies were left abandoned on her doorstep one night.mHowever, she has been challenged by the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, a civil rights group trying to locate 500 children of the thousands of dissidents who disappeared during the 1976 to 1983 dictatorship.

Mrs Herrera de Noble, 84, whose husband died in 1969, was childless and the Grandmothers group alleges her two children were taken from political prisoners who gave birth while in custody in secret torture centres.

Children of the so-called "disappeared" were often given to military or police families considered loyal to the government. Some have grown up not even knowing they were adopted until activists or judges announced efforts to obtain their DNA.

More:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/argentina/6912969/Argentina-media-heirs-take-DNA-test-in-Dirty-War-abduction-row.html

~~~~~~~~~
Kissinger approved Argentinian 'dirty war'Declassified US files expose 1970s backing for junta
Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles The Guardian, Saturday 6 December 2003 02.20 GMT

Henry Kissinger gave his approval to the "dirty war" in Argentina in the 1970s in which up to 30,000 people were killed, according to newly declassified US state department documents.
Mr Kissinger, who was America's secretary of state, is shown to have urged the Argentinian military regime to act before the US Congress resumed session, and told it that Washington would not cause it "unnecessary difficulties".

The revelations are likely to further damage Mr Kissinger's reputation. He has already been implicated in war crimes committed during his term in office, notably in connection with the 1973 Chilean coup.

The material, obtained by the Washington-based National Security Archive under the Freedom of Information Act, consists of two memorandums of conversations that took place in October 1976 with the visiting Argentinian foreign minister, Admiral César Augusto Guzzetti. At the time the US Congress, concerned about allegations of widespread human rights abuses, was poised to approve sanctions against the military regime.

More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/dec/06/argentina.usa

Argentina's authorities order DNA tests in search for stolen babies of dirty warChildren adopted by regime backers checked against bodies of those who 'disappeared' in the 70s and 80s

Rory Carroll, Latin America correspondent and Jeff Farrell in Buenos Aires
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 30 December 2009 20.04 GMT

http://static.guim.co.uk.nyud.net:8090/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2009/12/30/1262203302057/Marcela-Noble-Herrera-001.jpg

Marcela Noble Herrera leaves a lab after giving a DNA sample. Her
adoptive mother and family say they have nothing to hide.
Photograph: Rolando Andrade Stracuzzi/AP

In an era of state terror, it was perhaps the most chilling of all crimes: babies stolen from mothers who were condemned to "disappear".

Argentina's military dictatorship wrenched an estimated 500 children from doomed political prisoners and gave them for adoption to regime supporters during the so-called dirty war in the 70s and 80s.

Decades later, the babies are adults and now they – and the rest of Argentina – are finally discovering the truth about their origins. Compelled by a new law, suspected "stolen babies" are taking DNA tests to determine whether their biological parents were murdered.

This week it was the turn of Marcela and Felipe Noble Herrera, the heirs to a powerful media empire, to submit samples. Human rights campaigners allege the pair, who were adopted in 1976, were taken from prisoners who gave birth in clandestine jails.

The investigation is the latest of Argentina's attempts to confront the legacy of the 1976-1983 dictatorship which killed an estimated 30,000 suspected leftists. Trials have recently begun of retired military officers accused of some of the worst atrocities. It is part of a wider reckoning of decades-old human rights abuses across Latin America.

"It is a satisfaction," said Graciela Lois, whose husband, Ricardo, was abducted and last seen in Esma, a Buenos Aires torture centre run by the navy. "It's part of the cycle of understanding."

More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/30/argentina-dna-tests-babies-disappeared