Page 18 - Argentina - Carter, Regan, and Bush VP

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alone with, the drunken guard. He- told me that I was completely
free but not to communicate with my In**laws, never to go to
C6rdoba, and not to come out In Buenos Aires for several -
months. He repeated that all of my movements were going to be
carefully watched and to remember that they still had my
husband. I told him that I was going to leave the country, and
he told me not to, to let a long time pass; otherwise I would
have problems. It was 5 o'clock In the morning of December 24,
__ 1977. He gave me a document, a’Federal Police I.D., with one
of the photos they'd taken of me, but with a number other than
my real one, and a forged■signature.. He told me.to burn It as
soon as I reached El Chaco and to get a duplicate of my real
I.D. He gave me three million pesos, told me to go to the
Austral window, and said that I had passage reserved In the
name of Mrs. Ramos; that If there was no room they were going
to take me in the pilot's cabin and that I should buy my son a
cart for Christmas, He left me at the airport entrance* My
plane left at 9.20 pm. I realized that there were two men, an
18 year-old youth and a man around 40, who watched me until the
airplane took off. In El Chaco there were almost always
several pairs in cars along the street of my mother's house and
I never noticed anyone following me. Although I hardly went
out of doors for months.
After my release I lived at my house In El Chaco. When I
went to the police headquarters to arrange for my passport, I
was told after lengthy proceedings and psychological harassment
that they had received' a denunciation of my disappearance.
When they asked who had made it, I replied that It was my
mother. Then they made me sign <a statement that I had been
absent from my home voluntarily and for private reasons. After
signing the statement, I was issued a passport with the
warning: "With this record, you can't leave the country unless
you sign this statement.”

At its 46th session, the IACHR approved a resolution on this case. The
government, in a note dated October 8, 1979, presented its observations
denying any responsibility for the facts denounced.

The Commission undertook a study of the resolution it had adopted, In
view of the fact that the Argentine Government, In its request for a
reconsideration, had submitted new evidence. It decided however, to maintain
all of the above-mentioned Resolution, having found no evidence to discredit
the allegation made by the claimant.

OAS, Inter-American Commission on
Human Rights, Report on the Situation
of Human Rights In Argentina, 11 April
19&0, pp. 75-84 (English edition).