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History–Tours
19761976–1983 · Buenos Aires

The Dirty War and the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo

Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, with the Cabildo and Casa Rosada, where the Mothers marched
Photo: Roberto Fiadone. CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Argentina's military dictatorship kidnapped, tortured and killed people it labelled subversives; human rights groups estimate 30,000 were 'disappeared'. From 1977 the mothers of the missing walked in circles each Thursday in Plaza de Mayo wearing white headscarves, and they still march. The navy's ESMA school, the largest secret detention centre, is now a memorial and World Heritage Site.

Sites

  1. Site 1: Plaza de MayoWhite headscarf symbols painted around the May Pyramid.Map ↗
  2. Site 2: ESMA Museum and Site of MemoryOfficers' mess where detainees were held and tortured.Map ↗
  3. Site 3: Parque de la MemoriaRiverside memorial walls listing the disappeared.Map ↗

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More from the Cold War

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