Lino Oviedo Free - History of Twisted Human Rights...

Río de Janeiro (CIN-Brazil) After 2 years of the denial of the request for the extradition of Lino César Oviedo made by the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court, Brazil’s highest court, and the well versed opinion of such court in relation to the inconsistency and the legal nullity of the offenses that the Paraguayan government pretends to charge to the former general, the silence and slack attitude of the international organizations for the defense of Human rights is astonishing.
Dated December 17, 2001, the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court unanimously decided to deny the Extradition request issued by the Paraguayan government against the former chief of the Armed Forces Lino Cesar Oviedo Silva. In that instance it was also ordered his immediate freedom to travel and live, should he decide so, in the territory of the Federative Republic of Brazil.
Very few know or remember that at that moment the Reporter of the Process, Justice Maurício Corrêa, based his favorable vote for Oviedo, together with Justice Sepúlveda Pertence, on the grounds that the request was a “disguised political extradition”. This refers to certain cases in which a State (in this case Paraguay) maliciously attribute to a person an ordinary crime in order to guarantee his return to his country of origin, covering up the actual purpose of a political persecution.
Such Court did not only express itself regarding the perverse request of the then Paraguayan authorities but also proved the inconsistency and the procedural defects of the legal facts on which Paraguay intends to try and charge Oviedo, showing a high level of commitment with justice and the Law.
Lets recall that former General Lino Oviedo is being accused in his country of origin of the events that took place in March 1999 during which the then Vice President of Paraguay Luis Maria Argaña was assassinated. His death preceded the conflict of Plaza del Congreso (Congress Square) in Asunción, an event in which 7 people died and hundreds of others were injured as a result of the action of unidentified snipers. According to the Paraguayan justice Oviedo apparently incited the violence occurred in the Square.
Justice Maurício Corrêa affirmed that the facts cannot be examined excluding the historical context in which they took place. Recalling Lino Oviedo’s political career since the fall of Alfredo Stroessner, in 1989, the reporter of the court declared the predominance in the case of the political nature of the crimes at issue. “The former chief of the Paraguayan Armed Forces represents the main risk against the hegemony of the current dominant political group in Paraguay”, said the reporter.
Leaving that aside, according to Corrêa, all the other alleged mentors or instigators of crimes that were accused together with Oviedo are free in their country, whether due to the certainty that they did not participate in the events or the lack of evidence. Oviedo would apparently be the only one against whom an arrest warrant is still in force.
Justice Nelson Jobim, member of the Federal Court, examined the historical and main events that demonstrated that the assassination of Argaña was of no benefit whatsoever to Oviedo; on the contrary, the assassination caused him further problems because his political opponent, Luis Gonzáles Macchi, became President of Paraguay as a consequence of the events of March 1999.
Another Justice of the Brazilian supreme court, Celso de Mello, recalled that the Federal Constitution proper limited the power of Extradition by the Brazilian State. “Co-operation among countries as to matters of criminal law does not exonerate the State from protecting the rights of the fundamental guarantees of the citizens”.
In interviews with the press, the president of the Supreme Court, Justice Marco Aurélio, declared that the decision issued by the court confirms the legitimacy of the asylum that Brazil granted at the moment to Oviedo’s fellow party member and former President of Paraguay Raúl Cubas Grau, who also arrived in Brazil due to political persecution as a consequence of the same miserable events that took place in Paraguay during March 1999.