Alfonsin, Plagued by Labor Unrest, Terrorism, Urges Unity to ‘Consolidate Peace’ in Argentina

Troubled by right-wing terrorism and persistent labor unrest, President Raul Alfonsin on Friday appealed for national unity to “consolidate peace” in Argentina.

Speaking to members of his Radical Civic Union Party in the historic Plaza de Mayo on a chilly evening, Alfonsin blamed a current wave of small-scale terrorism on those who cherish the past and ignore “the summons of the future.”

“Terrorism cannot be attributed to insecurity or failures of democratic system,” he said in a 62-minute address. “Let us fight together to consolidate peace in Argentina.”

“It would be a grave mistake for the country if the fight against terrorism became a struggle between the government and the opposition,” he said.

Short on Specifics

Alfonsin’s speech was short on specifics despite persistent rumors in the Argentine press that he planned a shake-up of the country’s military commanders.

In a rally of their own across town Friday night, leaders of a moderate faction of the opposition Peronists denounced the economic austerity measures Alfonsin is pursuing in an attempt to conquer inflation and to repay Argentina’s crushing $50-billion foreign debt. Austerity has deepened the recession here and forced a decline in living standards for Argentina’s luxury-loving middle class.

Scoring the government before a huge banner demanding “social justice,” Peronist speakers urged support for a general strike the unions have called against Alfonsin on June 13 “to repudiate the policy of misery and dependence imposed by the government.” This will be the sixth walkout staged by the unions against the government.

“The economic policy of this government can be changed without knocking at the army’s door or seeking to overthrow constitutional government,” Carlos Grosso, a Peronist legislator, told a cheering crowd somewhat smaller than the one Alfonsin attracted to the plaza before the presidential palace.

Criticized by Rightists

For virtually all of his 30 months in office, Alfonsin, a centrist democrat, has been buffeted by an Argentine right more accustomed to being in power than to working as an opposition force.

On Monday, police discovered a bomb inside a military base Alfonsin was visiting in the interior city of Cordoba. Amid reports in the Argentine press that the government would fire the Cordoba military commander, Gen. Anibal Verdura, there were conflicting official versions over whether the bomb was an attempt to assassinate Alfonsin or was intended to be a right-wing warning.

Nearly a dozen bombs have exploded so far this month outside neighborhood offices of the Radical party in various cities. On Friday, a bomb exploded on a railroad track outside Cordoba. A communique left at the scene identified the blast as the work of right-wing terrorists “who declare war on the democratic government, . . . a Marxist, Masonic, imperialist sect which governs the country.”

Faced with a similar round of terrorism on the eve of legislative elections last November, Alfonsin declared a state of siege and used it to jail a dozen right-wing opponents, including a handful of military officers.

Tensions Heightened

Discovery of the bomb Monday by a police corporal at the heavily guarded 3rd Army Corps in Cordoba, while Alfonsin was watching an artillery exhibition nearby, heightened tension between the government and a military establishment resentful of civilian control.

The Alfonsin government has tried and convicted the military leaders who ruled Argentina from 1976 until December, 1983, on charges of state terrorism in connection with their so-called “dirty war” against Marxist terrorists. Nine thousand civilians are still missing and presumed murdered from that period. Five former junta members, including former Presidents Jorge R. Videla and Robert E. Viola, are serving jail terms for human rights abuses.

Human rights groups are pressing the government for further trials, insisting that there are nearly 700 other persons, most of them armed forces officers, who have been directly accused of abuses by survivors and should be tried.

Courts Instructed

Alfonsin has instructed military courts to speed up proceedings against senior officers but to excuse subordinates who obeyed orders without supplementary abuses.

Directly and indirectly, the armed forces have opposed the proceedings and demanded an end to the trials.

The Cordoba garrison is known to be particularly intransigent. In Alfonsin’s early months, the commanding general denied government human rights investigators access to the base. Gen. Hector Rios Erenu, the current army commander, canceled a scheduled visit to the garrison after a bomb was discovered on the base.