Features

September 24, 2007

The Emilio Mignone Lecture on Transitional Justice

NEW YORK CITY

Panelists:

Senator Cristina Fernández de Kirchner
Senator for Buenos Aires Province and First Lady of Argentina 

Judge Baltasar Garzón
Investigating magistrate, High Criminal Court (Audiencia Nacional), Spain 

Moderator:

Juan E. Méndez
ICTJ President 

This event was hosted by the ICTJ and NYU's Center for Human Rights and Global Justice.

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The Emilio Mignone Lecture

2007 marks the first year that the ICTJ and NYU have named the annual lecture on transitional justice after Emilio Mignone to honor his significant contributions to the field. At this year's lecture, we were honored to have two distinguished guests, Senator Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Judge Baltasar Garzón. The lecture was moderated by the ICTJ's President Juan E. Méndez, who, like Emilio Mignone, is both a transitional justice activist and someone with first-hand experience of human rights violations in Argentina.

The annual lecture was named after Emilio Mignone to honor his life long commitment to human rights and the search for accountability and justice. Mignone's dedication to human rights was intensified by the disappearance of his daughter Mónica, who was kidnapped by the military from their family home on May 14, 1976: "I owe much to many people, but basically I am in debt to Mónica. She caused me to place my life at the service of others." Emilio Mignone's dedication to human rights transcended his personal tragedy.

Throughout his life Emilio F. Mignone wrote extensively on social, educational and human rights issues. In 1976, when the Argentine military government implemented a campaign of terror against its domestic opponents, he became Vice President of the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights. Three years later he created the Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS) with three other lawyers whose children had "disappeared".

Staying in Argentina with his family-his wife, Angélica Mignone and four surviving children-Emilio Mignone became one of the most effective leaders of the Argentine human rights movement, particularly in his campaign against "disappearances," torture and politically inspired murders carried out by the state. He helped to document the crimes and assisted victims and families in their maneuvers through the judicial system, making use of the nascent system of international law for the protection of universal human rights.

When democracy returned to Argentina in 1983 Emilio did not cease in his efforts to obtain justice and raise public awareness, at home and abroad, of the crimes that had been committed and of the need for truth, justice and reparations. He testified in the trial that convicted five high-ranking military officers in 1985; he opposed efforts to restrict the prosecution of human rights violators; he wrote books on constitutional reform, education and human rights. In 1983 Emilio received the Letelier-Moffitt Memorial Human Rights Award of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. In 1988 he received the Roger E. Joseph Award from Hebrew Union College in New York City and that same year, the Human Rights Award of the New York-based Lawyers Committee for Human Rights.

Emilio Mignone died in Buenos Aires on December 21, 1998.

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Senator Cristina Fernández de Kirchner is senator for Buenos Aires Province and the First Lady of Argentina. In July 2007, she was officially confirmed as the ruling Front for Victory party's candidate for the presidency of Argentina in the general election scheduled for October 28, 2007. If elected, the Senator would become Argentina's second woman president, but the first to be elected to occupy that office.
During her tenure as Senator, Kirchner has advocated the prosecution of human rights violations in Argentina, particularly those that were committed during the "dirty war" of the 1970s and during the military dictatorship that lasted from 1976-1983. In 2003, she was instrumental in the passage of legislation that revoked amnesties for hundreds of military officers accused of wide-scale human rights abuses during the 1970s. She is helping Argentina address its violent legacy by focusing "on three main values: truth, memory, and justice. Some Argentines believe today that combating human rights abuses is a thing of the past or just a thing that only leftists and progressives worry about instead of seeing it as an ongoing process of human beings. My hope is that Argentina becomes a human rights role model in the world as a result of our efforts."

"Interview: Christina Fernández de Kirchner." Time Magazine, September 29, 2007. http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1666879,00.html

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Judge Baltasar Garzón is one of six investigating judges for Spain's National Court. His function is to investigate the cases that are assigned to him by the court, gathering evidence and evaluating whether the case should be brought to trial.

In 1993, Garzón took leave of absence to run for a seat in Spanish parliament on the socialist ticket; he was elected and held the post for a year before returning to the judiciary.
As investigating magistrate he has been at the helm of some of Spain's most high-profile cases, involving drug trafficking, high-level corruption, the Basque terrorist group ETA, and the GAL, a paramilitary group set up by officials within the government to fight a dirty war against the Basque separatists.
Garzón rose to international prominence with his indictment of leaders of the former Chilean military junta, including the ailing dictator Augusto Pinochet, on charges of genocide, terrorism and torture during the 1976-1983 dictatorship, following an investigation assigned to him by Spain's National Court. He issued an international arrest warrant when he learned that Pinochet was in London for a medical check-up; British police arrested Pinochet in October 1998. Pinochet was held under house arrest, but he was eventually released in 2000 when he was deemed unfit to stand trial. Garzón has also played a key role in indicting suspected Basque al-Qaeda terrorists.

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Juan E. Méndez, moderator of the 2007 Emilio Mignone Lecture, is a native of Argentina. From the time that he worked as a lawyer in Argentina in the early 1970s helping to build the modern human rights movement, Mendez created a road map for others to follow in representing political prisoners and defending political cases. When he was detained by the brutal Argentine security forces, his captors realized that they had a limited period of time to elicit the information they sought and, as a result, Mendez was subjected to particularly harsh torture. After 18 months imprisonment, Mendez became one of Amnesty International's first Prisoners of Conscience in Argentina, and advocates and diplomats alike pressured the junta, forcing Argentina to release him in 1977. In exile, Mendez has continued his human rights work, pioneering advocacy tools that are the basis of much international human rights work today.

In 2004, Mendez was asked to be the president of the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ). At the same time, the Secretary General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, asked him to serve as the United Nation's Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide. Both positions were at the heart of what Mendez felt was most important to his work so for the next three years, he worked in both capacities. (In March 2007, he stepped down from his UN position and now works solely for the ICTJ.)

Mr. Méndez earned a JD from Stella Maris University in Argentina and a certificate from the American University, Washington College of Law.