military junta

Eva Peron on the balcony of the Casa Rosada in 1951. Photo courtesy Religion News Service / Wikimedia Commons

In 1974, when the Rev. Jorge Bergoglio was the top Jesuit in his native Argentina, a former nightclub dancer named Isabel Peron came to head the nation – an accidental and weak president.

Isabel Peron served less than two years in office before a right-wing military coup placed her under house arrest, and launched a seven-year campaign of torture and killings of tens of thousands of trade unionists and other leftists: Argentina’s Dirty War.

As life in communist Poland propelled Pope John Paul II’s crusade against the Soviets and coming of age in Nazi Germany shaped Pope Benedict XVI, Argentina’s Dirty War posed deep, existential questions for the future Pope Francis.
Kaitlin Barker 5-20-2009

I spent my Monday lunch hour, and maybe longer due to D.C. traffic, standing with some 30 protesters across the street from the Burmese embassy, waving signs and shouting at curtained windows. Hundreds of other demonstrators around the world were also protesting on behalf of Aung San Suu Kyi.