Salvadoran court convicts 3 former army officers in the 1982 killing of 4 Dutch journalists

SAN SALVADOR El Salvador AP Three former Salvadoran military officers were convicted by a five-person jury late Tuesday for the killings of four Dutch journalists during the Central American nation s civil war They received -year prison sentences A jury made up of five women convicted the three men of murder in a lightning trial that began Tuesday morning in the northern city of Chalatenango announced Oscar P rez lawyer for the Foundation Comunicandonos that represented the casualties families P rez commented prosecutors had requested minimum -year prison sentences for all three Convicted were former Defense Minister Gen Jos Guillermo Garc a former treasury police director Col Francisco Mor n and Col Mario Adalberto Reyes Mena who was the former army commander of the Fourth Infantry Brigade in Chalatenango Garc a and Mor n are under police guard at a private hospital in San Salvador while Reyes Mena lives in the United States In March El Salvador s Supreme Court ordered that the extradition process be started to bring him back P rez mentioned that in addition to the convictions of the former high-ranking officers the judge condemned the authorities for the delayed justice and ordered the commander in chief of the armed forces President Nayib Bukele to issue a community apology to the sufferers The Dutch TV journalists Jan Kuiper Koos Koster Hans ter Laag and Joop Willemson had linked up with leftist rebels and planned to spend several days behind rebel lines reporting But Salvadoran soldiers armed with assault rifles and machine guns ambushed them and the guerrillas Garc a was deported from the U S in after a U S judge declared him responsible for serious human rights violations during the early years of the war between the military and the leftist Farabundo Mart National Liberation Front guerrillas The prosecution of the men was reopened in after the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a general amnesty passed following the - war It moved slowly but in March relatives of the casualties and representatives of the Dutch authorities and European Union demanded that those responsible for killing Jan Kuiper Koos Koster Hans ter Laag and Joop Willemson be tried The United Nations Truth Commission for El Salvador which was set up as part of a U N -brokered peace agreement in concluded there was clear evidence that the killings were the product of an ambush set up by Reyes Mena with the knowledge of other administrators based on an intelligence account that alerted of the journalists presence Other members of the military including Gen Rafael Flores Lima and Sgt Mario Canizales Espinoza were also accused of involvement but died Canizales allegedly led the patrol that carried out the massacre of the journalists Juan Carlos S nchez of the nongovernmental organization Mesa Contra la Impunidad in comments to journalists called the trial a transcendental step that the casualties have waited years for An estimated civilians were killed during El Salvador s civil war mostly by U S -backed ruling body shield forces The trial was closed to the residents Follow AP s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https apnews com hub latin-america Source