Thousands of demonstrators descended on Buenos Aires, on Monday, to denounce police brutality and to pressure on the government into releasing the whereabouts of missing detainee Santiago Maldonado.
SOT, Javier Avalos, father of Iago Avalos (Spanish): “Iago is a guy who worked as a mechanic; he went out to look for replacement parts. He went to get a wheel trim, the owners saw them, followed him for twenty blocks in another car, whilst shooting shots all the way, one of the them got him in the back, he was 17 years old and died on the spot.”
SOT, Matias Levonian, activist (Spanish): “We denounce the government of Mauricio Macri, the Cambiemos alliance (Let’s Change alliance) and the provincial governors that co-govern the state with them (the central government). We are not speaking of petty small things, it is not one-off thing, it is not one single policeman being absolved, it is something broader about the entire institution. It is not about generic violence, it is not about excesses: if it is violence and it is institutional, we are then dealing with political repression.”
SOT, Nora Morales de Cortinas, activist and human rights defender (Spanish): “The freedom of the boys who are unjustly kept (in prison). And let’s stop lowering the age of criminal responsibility. They are not delinquents. Children do not know, they are not born delinquents.”