POLITICS-ARGENTINA: Army Chief Hemmed in By Arms Deal Scandal

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Oct 7 1998 (IPS) - The office of the public prosecutor in Argentina asked the courts Wednesday to summon the head of the army and the ambassador to the United Nations to testify in the case of arms shipments smuggled to Croatia and Ecuador.

The arms smuggling scandal broke out in 1995, in the midst of a short war between Ecuador and Peru over a disputed stretch of border, in which Argentina intervened as a guarantor of the peace.

Prosecutor Carlos Stornelli submitted a written message to Judge Jorge Urso on Wednesday substantiating the request for a summons to be issued to the head of the army, General Martin Balza, who shot to prominence with his critical review of the army in 1995 for the human rights violations committed during the 1976- 83 military dictatorship.

Deputy Foreign Minister Fernando Petrella, Argentina’s current representative to the United Nations, was also cited to testify.

In a communique presented by his lawyer, Balza immediately responded his readiness to testify before Urso, who would question him on charges of criminal association, falsification of documents and embezzlement.

The shipment of 75 tonnes of light weaponry sent to Ecuador in 1995 was authorised by a presidential decree, and carried the signatures of President Carlos Menem as well as three of his ministers. But the reported destination was Venezuela, not Ecuador.

Shortly after, local newspapers published a denunciation by customs on an earlier shipment of arms, also authorised by a presidential decree. The 1991 shipment of 6,500 tonnes of cannons, rifles, missiles, landmines, grenades and ammunition was to be delivered to Panama, but ended up in Croatia.

Any shipment of arms to Croatia, at the time fighting for independence from the former Yugoslavia, violated a UN embargo on weapons sales to any of the warring factions.

Argentine military troops participating in peace-keeping missions in Croatia said they had seen local soldiers with rifles manufactured in Argentina.

Stornelli believes that Balza was aware of both arms deals – to Croatia in 1991 and Ecuador in 1995. He also suspects that the general took part in delivering army weapons to ‘Fabricaciones Militares’ – a company that answers to the Ministry of Defence – for illegal exportation.

Balza told the Chamber of Deputies last August that the army did not hand over “any kind of war material to be sold,” in an attempt to calm suspicions that an agreement to swap used arms for new signed in 1993 with ‘Fabricaciones Militares’ paved the way for the contraband operation.

But “it has been proven that the material which left the country destined to Ecuador and Croatia was stolen from the army’s arsenal,” the prosecutor stated in his lengthy written request that Balza and Petrella be called on to testify.

Balza flew to Brussels Tuesday for an 11-day stay, invited by the head of the forces of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), General Wensley Clark. On his return, his schedule will take him to the interior of the country, and on Oct. 27 he will form part of the entourage on Menem’s first official visit to Great Britain.

In his letter to the judge, the prosecutor named more than 20 military officers and public officials suspected of having engaged in criminal association. Observers say the head of the army may be forced to step down before the year is over.

The government and armed forces claim that their good faith was betrayed by the middlemen participating in the two arms smuggling operations under investigation.

One of the intermediaries, Diego Palleros, was captured in August in South Africa. But the courts in that country turned down Argentina’s extradition request. Palleros had testified that “high-level officials” were involved in the arms smuggling scandal.

In August, another middleman, retired officer Horacio Estrada, allegedly committed suicide under circumstances still being investigated.

But the scandal’s list of casualties does not end there. Former defence minister Oscar Camilion was forced to resign and legal charges were brought against him. The inspector of ‘Fabricaciones Militares’, Luis Sarlenga, was also forced to hand in his resignation, and was arrested last month.

The former head of the air force, Brigadier-General Juan Paulik, was forced to retire after confessing that he had warned Camilion of suspicions of shady arms deals.

And besides Balza and Petrella, the courts may now cite Foreign Minister Guido Di Tella and Labour Minister Antonio Erman Gonzalez, a former defence minister.

In September, former Argentine ambassador to Peru, Arturo Ossorio Arana, said he had warned several foreign ministry officials of the possibility that war material had been sent to Ecuador during that country’s war with Peru.