For the first time medical staff will be tried in Argentina regarding the stolen babies during the military regime. A midwife and two doctors are charged with falsifying babies’ birth certificates. About 500 babies were stolen at birth during the 1976-83 military regime. They were given to other families that supported the regime. Biological parents were killed or disappeared. Prosecutors in Buenos Aires accuse the three of “providing essential assistance” to hide the babies’ identity and hand them over to sympathizers of the Argentine military government. The accused are now in their 80s. The trial deals with the cases of nine stolen babies, five of whom were eventually able to recover their true identity.
The 36-year-old Francisco Madariaga, who was delivered by the midwife at Campo de Mayo and taken from his mother at birth says that it is “A very important trial because it will judge the complicity of doctors and midwives who were directly responsible for these crimes against humanity.” He adds that with this trial he and other stolen babies will be able to learn what happened to their mothers the day after they were born. He is happy that justice will triumph because he is the living proof of the crime. His mother has never been found.
Of the 500 babies stolen, more than 100 have been found through genetic research and the efforts of the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo, a rights group founded by women fighting to locate their stolen grandchildren.
