Los abogados están usando una ley de 1789, creada para que los piratas compensen a la sociedad por sus fechorías, será usada contra Sánchez de Lozada y Sánchez Berzaín.
En este artículo se nota la movilización de grupos y organizaciones de derechos humanos que sienten simpatía por Bolivia.
El abogado de los Sánchez es uno de los más caros, diced el artículo.
<> A ver, léanlo
Pirate Law to Defend Human Rights
Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2007 By SIOBHAN MORRISSEY/MIAMI
Following a bloody revolt four years ago in which scores of civilians
were killed and hundreds more injured, the Bolivian President resigned
and, with his defense minister, fled to the United States. They lived
in relative obscurity: the President in the tony Washington suburb of
Chevy Chase; the defense minister first in Key Biscayne, a Miami
suburb, and then to nearby Pinecrest.
But that comfortable obscurity is now at an end. Last week federal
lawsuits against both men were unsealed, revealing charges of crimes
against humanity — based on a 1789 law originally used against pirates.
The lawsuits — one in Maryland, the other in Florida — were filed last
month on behalf of the family members of 10 victims of the carnage in
Bolivia four years ago. They seek civil damages against former
president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, 77, and former defense minister
Carlos Sanchez Berzain, 48. The surviving family members maintain the
two men permitted Bolivian security forces to use deadly force against
unarmed men women and children, leaving 67 dead and more than 400
injured. The defense maintains the facts are being skewed for political
purposes and that both men were merely doing their jobs under difficult
circumstances.
Gregory B. Craig, perhaps best known for helping Elian Gonzalez reunite
with his father in 2000, told TIME he represents the former President
and may take on the former defense minister as well. The plaintiffs
have a phalanx of heavy-hitting attorneys, including the Human Rights
Program at Harvard Law School and the Center for Constitutional Rights.
"This is a pretty important case," says James Cavallaro, executive
director of the Harvard Law School program. "There are not many other
cases in which former Presidents are hailed before the court." In 1986,
the exiled dictator of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos was sued in
federal court in Hawaii under the same law; his estate was eventually
ordered to pay $2 billion to the 10,000 who filed the class action suit.
While the claims against Marcos spanned decades, those against the two
Bolivians center on September and October 2003, after the President
sparked a riot with his announcement of plans to build a $5 billion
pipeline to a Chilean port for the export of natural gas to the United
States and Mexico. Old territorial animosities against Chile combined
with an underlying anger among Bolivia's indigenous peoples that they
were being left out of lucrative oil and gas schemes. In the resulting
protests — led in part by current Bolivian President Evo Morales, who
was then a labor leader — children, pregnant women and old men were
killed. The lawsuit cites specific incidents, including one involving
an alleged government sniper, in the case against Sanchez de Lozada and
Sanchez Berzain.
The lawsuits against both Bolivians (and against Marcos) use a
centuries-old law, the Alien Tort Claims Act, adopted in 1789 to make
pirates pay compensation for their pillaging. Nearly 200 years later,
in 1979, human rights advocates began using the act to protect those
killed or tortured anywhere in the world. For many victims it is the
only justice they will attain because their home countries either won't
or can't bring criminal charges against the perpetrators. "The torturer
has become, like the pirate and slave trader before him, the enemy of
all mankind," Harvard's Cavallaro says. The suit seeks unspecified
damages for the survivors of the victims. But Cavallaro says that if it
simply gives the families a chance to confront the two men in court, it
will have served a good purpose.
"The State Department has said it's without merit and politically
motivated," says defense attorney Craig, adding that the former
President acted properly when he issued a decree declaring a national
emergency and ordered the troops to escort tanker trucks for fuel
distribution. "There's nothing improper about that," Craig says. "And
there's no allegation that the President himself ordered anyone to kill
anyone. So, it does seem to be quite clearly, even by the terms of the
complaint itself, something that falls within the four corners of his
duties as President."
Sanchez Berain released a statement welcoming the civil trial as a
chance for him to clear his name. He repeated Craig's arguments and
said that it was the machinations of Evo Morales that brought about the
tragedies, indeed, that it was his rights and Sanchez de Lozada's that
were being trampled. "The loss of human lives and the injuries were
sought to benefit the conspirators who ended up getting the power and
who now are in power."
Comentarios Goni y Chulupi, tratados como piratas
Tu dato del Time lo escuche en el espacio que tienes en Panamericana durante las mañanas, y me permitió acceder al artículo original el cual, una vez traducido, lo publiqué en EL DEBER donde trabajo en el área política.
Me parece interesante que en Estados Unidos, país al que, en nuestros días se lo considera como el pirata número uno del mundo, se esté utilizando una ley que combate esa actividad para procesar a uno de los personajes políticos más controvertidos de nuestro país.
En todo caso, creo, como lo comentó alguien, en USA se usa cualquier artilugio legal para meterle juicio a quien sea, lo cual obliga a actuar siempre en el marco de la ley.
Sin embargo, ¿será que en el caso de Goni el departamento de Estado dejará de protegerlo y se lo juzgará como debe ser?, lo dudo
Un abrazo
Me alegro que hayas usado mi dato, y tan rápido.
Tengo
la sospecha de que están usando aquella ley contra piratas porque de
esa manera podrian caerles a las fortunas de ambos personajes
bolivianos.
En realidad, los piratas ingleses que llegaban a
territorio norteamericano en aquellos tiempos, escapando de los
españoles, llevaban el producto de sus robos. Esta ley permitia la
confiscación de eos tesoros?
Si fuera asi, Goni tendría que cuidarse más de la justicia norteamericana que ded la boliviana.
¿Qué tú dices, chico? (Hay que practicar este acento).
Un abrazo
Humberto