AMSTERDAM/Madrid – Spanish authorities have arrested a Dutch-Argentine airline pilot on charges that decades ago he flew aircraft used to throw opponents of Argentina’s former military junta into the sea.
Julio Alberto Poch was arrested after an Argentine judge travelled to Europe and Bali to interview colleagues of his who said the pilot boasted about participating in the so-called death flights, Argentinas human rights secretariat said in a statement.
Poch (57), a retired lieutenant from the Argentine navy, was arrested on Tuesday at Valencia’s Manises airport during a stopover on the way back to Amsterdam.
Argentina had issued an international arrest warrant and requested that the Netherlands extradite Poch, but he was protected by his Dutch citizenship, the secretariat said.
Poch was working for the Dutch airline Transavia, owned by Air France-KLM, the airline said.
An Argentine government report says more than 11,000 people died or disappeared during what was known as the “Dirty War”, a crackdown on alleged leftwingers and other opponents of the military regime that ruled from 1976 to 1983.
Many of those abducted were sent to torture centres and then murdered. Some were drugged and then dropped out of aircraft or helicopters over the icy South Atlantic or the Rio de la Plata.
Poch is implicated in four criminal cases related to events between 1976 and 1983 and involving more than 1,000 victims, the Spanish government said. The Netherlands said he had been arrested at Argentina’s request.
Argentine federal judge Sergio Torres, who headed the investigation, was not immediately available for comment.
The judge travelled to the Netherlands in December 2008 to gather testimony from work colleagues of Poch, who said he confessed to them his involvement in the flights and the way prisoners were thrown out of aircraft.
Poch justified the killings saying “they were terrorists”, according to testimony cited by official Argentine news agency Telam.
Another pilot who worked with Poch said “his behaviour was outrageous, he defended throwing people off planes into the ocean”, Telam said. – (Reuters)