BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - An Argentine couple went on trial for kidnapping on Tuesday in the first lawsuit brought by a child who was adopted illegally during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship, rights campaigners said.
About 400 newborn babies were seized in clandestine torturecentres during Argentina's so-called dirty war and adopted bymilitary families or their friends. Human rights groups saynearly 90 of them have since discovered their true identities.
Maria Eugenia Sampallo, who discovered the truth about herpast in 2001, is the first of them to take legal action againsther adoptive parents. Under the Argentine legal system, a civilplaintiff can bring charges in a criminal court.
The adopting couple, Osvaldo Rivas and Maria CristinaGomez, and retired army Capt. Enrique Berthier, accused ofhanding her over to them, are on trial in a federal criminalcourt in Buenos Aires, charged with kidnapping her from herbiological parents, hiding her and falsifying a birthcertificate.
Sampallo's mother was abducted in 1977 when she was 6months pregnant and she gave birth during her detention. Bothher parents disappeared after they were arrested and areassumed killed by the military regime.
"This is a brave decision," said Victoria Donda, the firstknown child of disappeared political prisoners to become alawmaker in Argentina.
"This decision builds a path to justice, which is what ournation needs," she added. "I've come to support her because Ithink it's really important to be here."
According to human rights groups, up to 30,000 people werekilled during the dictatorship when the government cracked downon leftists and dissidents. An independent commission puts thatnumber at 11,000.
Soon after taking office in 2003, former President NestorKirchner persuaded Congress to scrap amnesty laws shieldinghuman rights abusers from prosecution for dictatorship-eracrimes, and the Supreme Court ruled similarly in 2005, pavingthe way for new and reopened rights investigations.
(Reporting by Cesar Illiano; Writing by Gaspard Sebag;Editing by David Wiessler)
