Argentine prosecutors have called for 25 years in prison for former military dictator Reynaldo Bignone and five other generals for rights violations during a 1976-83 "dirty war," judicial sources said Friday.
The six are accused of 25 forced disappearances, dozens of abuses, illegal searches and theft committed in the Campo de Mayo military base, one of the former regime's secret detention centers on the outskirts of Buenos Aires.
Ciro Annichiarico, a lawyer with the state Human Rights Secretariate, asked for the sentences at the close of the state's case in a federal court here.
The Argentine military ruled the country from 1976 to 1983, waging a ferocious campaign against the left in which an estimated 30,000 people went missing.
The 81-year-old Bignone, who is currently under house arrest, assumed the presidency in July 1982 as the regime neared its end in the wake of Argentina's humiliating defeat by Britain in the Falklands War.
Bignone returned to Argentina to civilian rule in December 1983, handing over the presidency to social democrat Raul Alfonsin after national elections.
Besides Bignone, five other former military have been accused in the Campo de Mayo crimes.
Bignone faces other charges that were brought separately, one for the theft of the children of prisoners who were "disappeared" and another for the kidnapping and torture of doctors and nurses at a hospital on the outskirts of Buenos Aires.
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