CIA agents tortured Cuban diplomats in Argentina

Two agents of the Central Intelligence Agency of United States (CIA) participated in the torture of two Cuban diplomats during the last military dictatorship in Argentina (1976-1983), as was denounced by the State Agency of legal information (Infojus).

"The kidnapping of the two Cuban diplomats in Argentina, was ordered in August 1976 to score one star more in criminal actions against humanity. They were wanted not dead, but alive. They kidnapped them and took them to Orletti, where tortured them brutally. "They came to torture them, especially, a CIA agent assigned to Pinochet, Michael Townley and another agent of the CIA of Cuban origin, Guillermo Novo Sampol", commented to Infojus journalist and human rights activist Graciela Ramírez.

Ramirez, who has lived in Cuba since 1994, at the time was responsible for collecting testimony to the National Commission of Argentina on the disappearance of people. She details that to participate in the torture, Novo Sampol arrived from Miami and Townley came from Santiago of Chile because he belonged to Augusto Pinochet's fearsome secret police the DINA (National Intelligence Directorate). According to Ramirez, the information about the involvement of the CIA agents in the torture of two Cubans was in the registered testimonies of the chilean Juan Manuel Contreras Sepúlveda of the Dina, who corroborated with the argentinean judge María Servini .

Cubans Jesús Cejas Arias and Crescencio Nicomedes Galañena Hernández arrived in Buenos Aires in 1975 to work in the Embassy in their country. In August 1976 they were abducted in the diplomatic headquarters nearby. They were 23 and 26 years old, respectively. They were transferred to the clandestine detention center Automotores Orletti, where they were tortured and killed. The kidnapping of the Cuban people was carried out within the framework of the so-called Condor Plan, in which cooperated the dictatorships in Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay to persecute and eliminate political opponents during the decades of the 70s and 80s of the last century. Only in Argentina the number of missing people during the last dictatorship is around 30,000 people.

In June, 2012 in Virreyes, on the banks of the Río de la Plata, was found a metal barrel with the remains of Galañena. A year later, in the same area, they found the remains of Cejas. For the kidnapping and disappearance of two Cubans the Argentine justice sentenced four oppressors to prison, including retired General Rodolfo Cabanillas who had administered Orletti. However, the two CIA agents who left Argentina once finished with the torture never appeared before justice.