MONTEVIDEO: Uruguay's Congress passed legislation on Thursday that allows fresh investigations into human rights abuses committed by the military during a 1973-1985 dictatorship despite a controversial amnesty law.
The new law, which also says rights crimes cannot be subject to a statute of limitations, was drafted by the ruling coalition of President Jose Mujica, who spent years behind bars for his guerrilla activities in the 1960s and 1970s.
"This is a historic night," ruling-party lawmaker Luis Puig told Reuters after the vote early on Thursday. "The culture of impunity imposed during 25 years must be dismantled and turned into a culture of human rights."
Mujica's leftist political bloc pushed for the new law after the Supreme Court ruled in May that state-sponsored killings committed during the dictatorship should be classed as murders rather than human rights crimes.
The ruling, issued in the case of two former military officers jailed for 28 killings, drew fierce criticism from human rights activists because murder prosecutions are subject to a statute of limitations.
The measure passed by Congress on Thursday, opposed by the opposition and retired military officers, means human rights crimes cannot lapse on Nov. 1, as the Supreme Court ruling implied.
Some legal analysts say the new legislation effectively scraps a long-standing amnesty law shielding former military officers from prosecution.
A senior court source who asked not to be named said it did not annul the amnesty but would weaken it significantly in practice.
About 200 Uruguayans were kidnapped and killed during the last dictatorship, and the South American nation of 3.4 million people has been split over how to deal with former officers accused of crimes committed during military rule.
Uruguayans voted to uphold the 1986 amnesty law in two referendums in 1989 and 2009, and the opposition voted against the new law on the grounds that it went against public opinion.
"This flies in the face of what Congress has voted, which was ratified twice by the Uruguayan people," said Gustavo Borsari, a legislator for the center-right National Party.
In May the Inter-American Court of Human Rights said that Uruguay must not impose limits on probes into past abuses. Rights groups have pushed for fresh investigations.
Mujica backed scrapping the amnesty as part of his election platform, but the result of the 2009 referendum and concerns over the potential political cost led him to change course and urge Congress to uphold it earlier this year.
Mujica, who was jailed for years for his role in the Tupamaros guerrilla group, has urged Uruguayans not to dwell on the brutality of military rule.
Despite the amnesty law, some prominent dictatorship figures have been convicted.
Juan Maria Bordaberry, who headed the military government from 1973 to 1976, and Gregorio Alvarez president from 1981 and 1985 both received long jail sentences for crimes that were not covered by the amnesty. Bordaberry died this year.
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