Argentina plans to wipe out guerrillas

Press, 22 July 1976, Page 8

Argentina plans to wipe out guerrillas

NZPA-Reuter Buenos Aires |i |< The Argentine security: 1 forces are aiming at the annihilation of the country’s'i Marxist guerrilla movement.' after the killing of the guer- ■ rilla chief, Roberto Santucho, I in a gun-battle with security j forces on Monday. An official Argentine Armv statement has confirmed that' in addition to Santucho. 39-i year-old founder and j commander-in-chief of the! People’s Revolutionary Army. I three of his top aides had also been killed. The statement said the| total guerrilla d»*ath toil was seven, although informed ‘ military sources made it 12. The sources said the deaths meant that the guerrilla army had been “beheaded." They predicted a mopping-up operation of the remaining members of what

was until recently the most dangerous guerrilla movement in Latin America. Documents found in the north-west suburb of Villa Marteili in the flat where Santucho was shot with his! aide. Jose Benito Urteaga, in- j eluded a list of guerrilla [ “safe houses" throughout j Argentina, the sources said, j A document carried by: (Urteaga mentioned an address in a southern suburb. Security forces who went there immediately after the Villa Marteili raid surprised Sand killed five more guerjrillas the official statement I said. 1 These included the No. 2 in the guerrilla hierachy, Enrique Gorriaran Merlo. and another Santucho aide, Domingo Mena. The communique made no mention of casualties among troops and police. But in-

formed sources said Captain Juan Carlos Leonetti, mentioned in an earlier communique as “killed by subversive delinquents,” led the Villa Marteili raiding party. The sources said Captain j Leonetti was an army intelligence officer who had been [on the track of Santucho for several months.

■ The official communique ■said Santucho and Urteaga at first offered no resistance when surprised by a patrol, acting on a tip-off. who went to their second-floor apartment in a Odem skyscraper block. While their identities were being checked. Santucho pulled a gun, and the patrol shot both men. Santucho was carrying an air ticket in a false name for a flight which would have taken him to Cuba, the communique said.