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Pro-Búsqueda Press Release on Serrano Cruz Case
Former Salvadoran army chief of State testified in court about the Serrano Cruz Case
General Rafael Flores Lima
For the first time, General Rafael Flores Lima, former Chief of State of the Armed Forces, was summoned to the testify at the Attorney General’s office in Chalatenango, as a result of the penal process promoted by the Asociación Pro Búsqueda (Association for the Search of Disappeared Children during the armed conflict). This is in compliance of the investigation ordered by the Inter American Court for Human Rights, in a sentence issued against the Salvadoran State, on March 29, 2005, to respond for the forced disappearance of the girls Erlinda and Ernestina Cruz.
The two girls disappeared when they were 3 and 7 years old respectively, in the military operation known as “Cleaning Operation” or “Guinda de Mayo” (word referring to how people ran for safety under attack), in which at least 46 children disappeared, between May and June 1982, by direct action of Salvadoran Army soldiers.
The former Chief of State, testified at the Attorney General’s Office in Chalatenango, on June 25th, around eleven thirty, accompanied by two Salvadoran Army lawyers. Prior to his arrival, military vehicles surrounded the area and unidentified individuals took pictures of the disappeared children’s family members who were demanding justice outside the Attorney General’s Office. A security operation was kept outside the office during the judicial process.
The presence of the retired general, scheduled at eleven, was postponed thirty minutes because of his reluctance to face the victims’ relatives who demanded justice.
The process lasted over four hours, as General Flores Lima had to respond all the inquiries made by the Attorney General’s representative and the Pro-Búsqueda association’s lawyer. His responses were evasive, but he could not deny the responsibility of the chiefs of the Elite Battalions Atlacatl and Belloso, from the Military Headquarters No. 1 and the 4th Brigade of Infantry, during the military operation where the girls Ernestina and Erlinda Serrano Cruz disappeared.
The minutes of the interview will be submitted to the Judge of the First Instance Court in Chalatenango, who will evaluate its contents to analyze the responsibilities of the former military chief.
It is important to highlight that General Rafael Flores Lima was Chief of State of the Armed Forces of El Salvador, from January 1981 to December 1982; and from January 1983 to January 1988 he was Vice Minister of National Defense.
The Truth Commission established that the massacre of Junquillo, occurred in March 1981; of Sumpul, occurred in 1981; of El Mozote in December 1981; of El Calabozo in August 1982; Las Hojas, in February 1983, among others, were carried out by members of the army. Therefore, General Flores Lima, in his capacity of Chief of State, was directly responsible for commanding operations of military unit chiefs, brigades and battalions. Likewise, as Vice Minister, he must have been informed of the activities carried out by military units.
During the penal process, the Salvadoran Army has repeatedly denied the existence of the military operation in question and the participation of the Atlacatl Battalionhowever, the Pro Búsqueda Association proved its existence before the Commission and the Inter American Court for Human Rights. This has also been proved at the penal process in the Court of First Instance in Chalatenango.
Fifteen years have passed since the judicial process was started by the mother of Erlinda and Ernestina, Victoria Cruz, with the accompaniment of Pro Búsqueda founder, the Jesuit priest Jon Cortina, in 1993. Since then, the State through judicial authorities, denied justice to the Serrano Cruz family and this is why the Inter American Court for Human Rights condemned the State.
Pro-Búsqueda considers the trial of high rank military officers is an unprecedented case, which marks the beginning of a new process for the justice system in our country: overcoming the state of impunity.
TRUTH, JUSTICE AND REPARATION FOR THE VICTIMS
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Related to this article:
Serrano Cruz Case in the Inter American Court of Human Rights