Brazil News
BRASILIA – The government informed the Organization of American States (OAS) that it will not reopen the case of journalist Vladimir Herzog, because of the Amnesty Law, reported online media.
Vladmir Herzog Death Remains Closed Case
Vladiimir Herzog died in October 1975 during the military dictatorship, while imprisoned in the premises of the São Paulo headquarters of the Information Operations Department – Center for Internal Defense Operations (DOI-CODI).
The Herzog family and non-governmental organizations who made the complaint to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights criticized Brazil’s response to the request for an investigation into the circumstances of the death.
Brazil’s 47-page response to the complaint cannot be released because the government classified it as confidential. According to the organizations that submitted the complaint, Brazil argues that a new investigation into the death cannot be made without violating the Amnesty Law.
The Herzog family wants Brazil to recognize that he died under torture. At the time of death, the military released a picture to support the official version of suicide. The image shows Herzog’s body in his cell as if he had hanged himself with a belt. In the photo, the level of the belt securing Herzog’s body to the window, combined with the the dead man’s height, makes suicide seem unlikely.
Paulo Egydio Martins, governor of São Paulo during the dictatorship, told Globo reporter Geneton Moraes Neto that the military’s version was a farce.
“They faked a suicide. The suicide was made up. There was no suicide. Vladmir Herzog was murdered in the premises of the Second Army, on Tutóia Street in São Paulo,” said Egydio.
The Secretary of Human Rights said in a statement that the government already compensated the family, in 1997, and that the state has publicly acknowledged responsibility for the arbitrary arrest and death of Herzog.
For the Vladimir Herzog’s son, Ivo Herzog, the death was never clarified. “It has been clarified? So why do we have a death certificate that says he committed suicide? Who are the people who killed my father?
Perhaps the world will never know for certain who killed Vladimir Herzog.
