By SHANNON MARCOUX
Shown above is the National Cathedral in San Salvador, El Salvador, where the memorial to the slain Jesuits is displayed.
(Courtesy of Marc Alibrandi)
Nearly 25 years ago, a death squad marched onto the campus of the Universidad Centroamericana and into the Jesuit residence on campus. They gunned down the six Jesuits who were sleeping in the house, their housekeeper and the housekeeper’s thirteen-year-old daughter. This was just one of the horrific human rights violations that occurred during the Salvadoran Civil War that lasted roughly 12 years, beginning in 1979. Now, two and a half decades later, Dr. Almudena Bernabeu, an international attorney and transnational justice program director for the Center for Justice and Accountability, is seeking justice for this crime, one of the most publicized and horrific events of the War.
Bernabeu, who was named one of Time’s 200 Most Influential People in the World, spoke at Fordham’s Lincoln Center campus Tuesday night about the idea of transnational justice and the process by which she has been able to bring about justice in the case of the Salvadoran Jesuits. The event was cosponsored by the Columbia University Seminar on Latin America and Fordham’s Latin American and Latino Studies Institute (LALSI) and Institute of International Humanitarian Affairs (IIHA).
The international attorney opened her talk with a discussion of the context of the murders within Salvadoran history and the Civil War before proceeding to discuss the main reason those responsible for the murders have not stood trial in El Salvador for their crimes: the amnesty law that was passed in 1993 to protect former military and political leaders retroactively from crimes committed during the War.
Because this amnesty law protects many of the perpetrators (the murders were carefully orchestrated by a group of powerful individuals that included the former president, minister of defense, minister of the interior and other powerful Salvadoran leaders) from being tried for their crimes, Bernabeu has used laws within her native country of Spain to conduct an in-depth investigation of the incident and to begin to build a case against some of the men involved. Because five of the Jesuits were Spanish nationals, universal jurisdictional law (which allows all countries to prosecute those who violate human rights in any country) allows Bernabeu to bring charges against the responsible parties.
She has encountered several obstacles, one of which is a lack of cooperation from the United States. She noted in her speech that some of the evidence she has located in the Library of Congress has since disappeared, and she also explained that much of the future trial’s success rests on the U.S.’s willingness to extradite one of the suspects who is currently in U.S. federal prison for immigration fraud.
On the probability of the U.S. releasing the suspect to Spain to stand trial for these war crimes, Bernabeu said, “The U.S., in my short experience, is not a country that likes to cooperate.”
She went on to explain that the U.S. does not look favorably upon extradition and that many countries do not have extradition treaties with the United States because of the death penalty. Both of these factors will play into the country’s decision whether or not to release the suspect to Spain.
Grace Hulseman, FCRH ’16, has visited El Salvador twice, most recently as part of the Global Outreach trip over winter break. After the presentation, she shared her predictions on what the U.S. will do: “I’m obviously not an expert on the matter, but I will be very surprised if the U.S. agrees to extradite him without a significant fight because the U.S. is typically hesitant to compromise their own power,” Hulseman said. That being said, I hope the U.S. government recognizes the potential for justice here and decides to cooperate with the Spanish; given the role of U.S. foreign policy in the Salvadoran war, I think this could be an opportunity to acknowledge some of our faults.”
Despite the potential difficulties of bringing charges against Salvadoran criminals, many of whom currently reside in the United States, in a Spanish court, Bernabeu is confident that justice will be served for the Jesuits and their families both in Spain and in El Salvador. She believes that the Salvadoran government is close to repealing the amnesty law, which would allow the Salvadoran government to bring their own charges against the criminals. Bernabeu also expressed hope that the trials in Spain, when they occur, will help set an international precedent for the way in which mass human rights violations, like genocide, are punished.
Hulseman echoed this hope for a positive outcome. “Ideally, those who were responsible for violence on all fronts, including foreign actors, will be held responsible and will be forced to publically acknowledge their role in the atrocities of the war,” Hulseman said.
The event ended with a question and answer session. Dr. O. Hugo Benivides, director of the Latin American and Latino Studies Institute at Fordham, asked Bernabeu where she finds the perseverance to continue and what students should be able to take away from her talk.
She responded that she is able to persevere because of her “hope that everyone has a good side and will open their eyes.” As to what students should take away from this, she quoted a Jesuit friend of hers, saying, “If you don’t do it, who the hell is going to do it?”
Father Joseph Koterski, S.J., recalled the murders and the response of the Jesuit community, saying, “The Jesuit community reacted with horror at the murder of some of our brothers. Whether we agreed or disagreed with the political activity of our brothers, they were murdered in cold blood, and that’s a tragic crime. The proper thing the government should have done if they believed the brothers were committing a crime would be to take them to court.”
Now it is the government who will appear in court, and time will tell whether Bernabeu and her colleagues will be successful in rendering justice against the murderers. Bernabeu represented the Center for Justice and Accountability as part of the team that helped convict former Guatemalan president Efrain Rios Montt for his role in the genocide that occurred in his country in 1982 and 1983, so the case of the Jesuit murders is not her first experience with transnational justice, and it will likely not be her last.
