Dirty War: the systematic disregard of Sedena to hide information about the bodies it threw into the sea

MEXICO CITY (Process).– The National Institute of Transparency, Access to Information and Protection of Personal Data (Inai) instructed the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena) to deliver information related to “the Flights of Death”, required by the Clarification Mechanism Historical Commission (MEH), of the Commission for Access to the Truth, Historical Clarification and the Promotion of Justice for Serious Human Rights Violations committed from 1965-1990, but the department in charge of General Luis Cresencio Sandoval has entered in contempt and intends for only a minimal part of the information to be made public.

In a statement to announce the resolutions, the MEH explained that the “Flights of Death” were a “counterinsurgency strategy” carried out between 1973 and 1981, in which people from “various political-military dissidents (guerrillas) were executed.” , whose bodies were “thrown out to sea from military aircraft manned by Mexican Army personnel on flights operated from Military Air Base #7, Guerrero.”

In accordance with the review resources, identified as RRA 2789/24 and RRA 2751/24, approved by the counselors Adrián Alcalá Méndez, Norma Julieta del Río Venegas, Blanca Lilia Ibarra Cadena and Josefina Román Vergara, the Sedena is obliged to deliver to the MEH seven thousand 574 pages corresponding to a file opened in 2000 by the military justice system for the “Flights of Death”, which would complement the eight thousand 704 that the agency had not provided to the applicants.

Likewise, the secretariat headed by Cresencio Sandoval will have to carry out a new search, in order to respond to the request for the lists of victims of the “Flights of Death” and of soldiers who were prosecuted for these events before military justice, and who in A first instance had denied the existence of the information.

Although the resolutions of the Inai are unassailable, to date the Sedena has not delivered the information required in the two appeals for disagreement, which “represents a repeated policy on the part of the Army regarding access to the truth,” he said. the MEH.

Resolution RRA 2789/24 derives from a request for information to Sedena in which the MEH requested “a full copy of file SC/034/2000/IV/IE-BIS, contained in 32 volumes.” In January 2024, the agency responded that it made available the public version of the file, which consists of 13 volumes, but only in its physical version, not digital as required by the MEH, which implied a cost of one peso per page, discounting the first 20 sheets, if it is a simple copy, or 23 pesos per sheet if you wanted a certified copy.

After making the payment of eight thousand 684 pesos, the Transparency Unit of the Sedena only delivered one thousand 140 pages, hence on February 27, the MEH processed an appeal for review before the Inai for not providing complete information.

In response, the Superior Military Court, custodian of the documentation, explained to Inai that while attending to the MEH, “in a supervening manner”, the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Human Rights of the Attorney General’s Office of the Republic requested a certified copy of the same prior investigation, which would make it impossible to deliver the remaining material to the MEH because “it is currently classified.”

The Inai resolved that “it is not possible to validate what was stated by the Sedena in its pleadings letter”, so it ordered “that the missing documents of the eight thousand 704” of the military file be delivered to the appellant within a period of no longer than 10 business days after notification, “at no cost, as long as the corresponding payment has already been made.”

The deadline set by the Inai for the delivery of remaining documentation expired on April 22, without this having occurred.

Transparency request

Regarding resolution RRA 2751/24, this originates from the alleged lack of information related to “the list of people who were thrown into the sea from Army planes between January 1, 1965 and December 31, 1990” from the Pie de la Cuesta Air Base, in Guerrero, as well as the list of soldiers prosecuted “by military justice for their possible responsibility in these events”, for which the military file SC/034/2000/IV/ was integrated. IE-BIS.

In the request for information dated January 10, 2024, the MEH considered that there were 350 victims of the Death Flights during the period of the Dirty War.

Reiterating the argument of lack of information, during the review process, Sedena responded to Inai that it unsuccessfully searched for the required documentation in the files of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the National Defense, in the Mexican Air Force Command, the General Directorate of Archives and History, the Superior Military Court and the Attorney General’s Office of Military Justice.

However, the Inai considered that the Sedena’s responses “do not allow us to generate certainty about the search criteria used to locate the information of interest” nor do they take into account that the applicants provided the military file number in which the information could be located. requested.

Furthermore, the resolution considered as evidence of the existence of the lists of victims and perpetrators published journalistic notes, including in Proceso, in which reference is made to the preliminary investigation opened in the Office of the Attorney General of Military Justice, today the Office of the Attorney General of Justice. Military, with number SC/034/20000/IV/IE-BIS, “initiated against various soldiers for the murder of civilians during (…) the era known as ‘Dirty War’, carried out at Military Area Base #7, with headquarters in Pie de la Cuesta”.

The Inai recalled that recommendation 26/2001 of the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) refers to the “Flights of Death” that were carried out “based on close coordination” between the Guerrero government of that time and the state representation of the Sedena, hence “it is considered that the search for information should be carried out in the same way in the 35th Military Zone (Chilpancingo), the 37th Military Zone (Santa Lucía) and its base aerial.”

Regarding the relevance of making known the names of the victims of the “Flights of Death”, in its resolution it concluded that “the fundamental right of access to information must prevail, since through this it seeks not only to satisfy an individual interest , but the need to guarantee the right to the truth”, non-repetition, and favors social scrutiny.

In the case of military personnel prosecuted for perpetrating serious human rights violations, the existence of “a greater public interest in making known the required information, namely their name, the charges they faced, the resolutions issued in their proceedings, as well as the legal status that said people currently have.”

In this resolution, as in the previous one, the Inai called on the Sedena to deliver the required information in ten days, a deadline that expired on April 29 without having followed the instructions of the autonomous body.