321% 9 May 1917 SUBJECT Counterterrorism in the Southern Cone The security forces of Argentina Bolivia Brazil Chile Paraguay and Uruguay have for some time engaged in a formalized exchange of information on leftist terrorists Moreover these governments jointly 3 carry out operations against subversives on each other' 5 soil This effort dubbed Operation Condor is not publicly kno TV One aspect of the program involving Chile Uruguay and Argentina envisages illegal operations outside Latin America against exiled terrorists particularly in Europe Because the existence of Condor is known to foreign security services such activities have so far been frustrated The extent of cooperation in Condor is unusual in Latin America even though the exchange of intelligence information by governments facing a common problem is a rootine practice throughout the worldl i The military-controlled governments of the Southern Cone all consider themselves targets of international Marxism Having endured real and perceived threats from leftist terrorists these governments believe that the very foundations of their societies are threatened In most cases government leaders seek to be selective in the pursuit and apprehension of suspected subversives but control over security fOrces generally is not tight enough to prevent innocents from being harmed or mistreated Cultural and historical developments in the region go a long may toward explaining if not justifying the often harsh methods In Hispanic law for instance a suspect is presumed guilty until proven innocent In addition most Latin American constitutions have pnovisions for states of seige or other emergency clauses which greatly increase the governments' powers of arrest detention and censorship I There is a long history of bilateral efforts to control subversion in the Southern Cone countries The regional approach eventually formalized in Condor however apparently was endorsed in early lgli when security officials from all of the member countries except Brazil agreed to establish liaison channels and to facilitate the movement of security officers on government business from one country to the other - Among the initial aims of Condor was the exchange of information on the Revolutionary Coordinating Junta JCRl an organization believed to consist of_representatives of terrorist groups from Bolivia Uruguay 3 5 0 1 3 5 0 Chile Argentina and Paraguay The coordinates- -activities Ei5 and provides propa ianda and logistical support Tor lits members The Junta has representatives in Europe and they are believed to haVe been involv in the assassinations in Paris of the Bolivian ambassador to France lasteafi May and an Uruguayan mil itary attache in 19 4 The attache had been involved in the successful campaign to suppress Uruguay' 5 terrnrist Tupamaros a member group of JCR i Condor' overall campaign against subversion reportedly was inton- sified last summer when members gathered in Santiago to organize more detailed long-range plans Decisions included I -- The development of a basic computerized data bank in Santiago All members will contribute information on known or suspected terrorists Brazil agreed to provide gear for Condortel Le the group' 5 communications network i -- Uruguav consented to join Chile and Argentina_in cnuert__ operations against JCR activitiesl I in Europe sl c The basic miSsion of Condor teams to be sent overseas reportedly was to liquidate top- level terrorist leaders Non terrorists also were reportedly candidates for assassination Uruguayan opposition politician Wilson Ferreira if he should travel to Europe and some leaders of Amnesty Internation were mentioned as targets Ferreira may have been removed from the list to have good contacts among US congressmen A training course was held in Buenos Aires fer the team heading overseas More recently Condor leaders were con- sidering the dispatch of a team to London disguised as businessmen to monitor suspicious activity in Europe Another proposal under study included the collection of material on the membership location and political activities of human rights groups in order to identify and expose their socialist and Marxist connections Similar data reportedly are to be collected on church and third world groups Evidence although not conclusive indicates that cooperation among security forces in the Southern Cone extends beyond legal methods Last May for example armed men ransacked the offices of the Argentine Catholic Commission on Immigration and stole records containing information on thousands of refugees and immigrants The Argentine police did not investigate the crime a signal that Latin refugees principally from Chile and Uruguay were no longei welcome A month later 24 Chilean and Uruguay refugees many of whom were the subjects of commission files were kidnapped and tortured After their releaSe some of the refugees insisted i %m SEKC I - may their interrogators were security officers from Chile and Uruguay number of Uruguayans were held in Buenos Aires last Summer for two weeks and then flown to Montevideo in an Uruguayan plane Uruguayan military officers offered to spare them their lives if they would agree to allow themselves to be captured by authorities -- as if they were an armed group attempting to invade the country Moreover two prominent political exiles in Argentina were killed under mysterious circumstances Condor also is engaged in non-violent activities including warfare and a propaganda campaign These programs heavily use the media to publicize crimes and atrocities committed by terrorists By appealing to national pride and the national conscience these programs aim to secure the support of the citizenry in the hope they will report anything out of the ordinary in their neighborhoods Propaganda campaigns are constructed so that one member country publishes information useful to another -- without revealing that the beneficiary was in fact the source For example Bolivia and Argentina reportedly are planning to launch a campaign against the Catholic Church and other religious groups that allegedly support leftist movements Bolivia will collect information on the groups and then send it to Argentina-for publication The Condor communications system uses both voice and teletyoe Member countries communicate via radio and each is required to maintain an open channel Ho commercial equipment is used but each country can monitor the conversations of another over the Condor net Sensitive data f _not_gf_conge n to_aJl memberst_are via diplomatic pouch r I Condor suffers from some organizattigmbx1 but this TEEtor as not inhibited its overall effectiyeness tightened_security_measuresg Ei3 bX1 I TSecurity has been streng ned at Condor's operations in Buenos Aires and compartmentation has been increased In addition once a Condor member has declined to participate in an operation he is excluded from all further details of that Houses less ragtive_membersi_such_as Paraguav and Bolivia 4 S- i may not oe aware of many operations Outside the Condor umbrella bilateral cooperation between other security organizations in the region also is strong For example intelligence organizations in Argentina Uruguay and Chile work together closely Each security organization assigns advisers to the other countries primarily to identify subversives in exile 3t c - 35 0 This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu