BRAZIL: The Debate Over Keeping Historical Documents Secret Indefinitely

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Feb 3 2005 (IPS) - Can “national interests” or “state security” justify keeping certain documents secret indefinitely? These are the reasons invoked in Brazil to keep under wrap the records pertaining to the 1865-1870 War of the Triple Alliance, in which the population of the neighbouring country of Paraguay was decimated.

Controversy over historical documents that have possibly been kept hidden from the public was triggered by the recent intensification of demands that the archives from Brazil’s 1964-1985 military dictatorship be opened up.

Activists are calling for the de facto regime’s records to be made available, in order to clarify the fate of victims of forced disappearance.

The Brazilian press has quoted government sources who, speaking on condition of anonymity, defend the need to keep certain documents, like some of those that date back to the War of the Triple Alliance in Paraguay, secret indefinitely, because they involve border questions and acts of cruelty committed by Brazilian forces.

In that war, triggered by boundary conflicts and economic and commercial disputes, the allied forces of Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay fought against Paraguay.

More than half of the population of Paraguay, and two-thirds of the men, were killed in the war. The country also lost part of its territory, and the economy, up to then the most prosperous in South America, was left in ruins.

Rumours of the existence of such documents surprised historians like Francisco Doratioto, author of “Maldita Guerra, Nueva Historia de la Guerra del Paraguay”, a history of the War of the Triple Alliance that has drawn praise for its depth of research and the wide body of documents it is based on.

“My research leads me to believe that there are no secret archives on the question. But I don’t rule out the possibility of the existence of hitherto unknown documents, in Itamaraty (the Brazilian foreign ministry) or in the army,” which may have been kept secret not due to a deliberate effort, but because of a lack of organisation and classification, he told IPS.

Doratioto argued that there is no justification for keeping records confidential indefinitely, although in some exceptional cases, such as international negotiations, “national interests may require lengthy time periods” before they can be released to the public. However, historical contexts change and the need for confidentiality eventually disappears, he added.

There are no lingering border conflicts between Brazil and Paraguay, Doratioto pointed out.

In 1872, the two countries signed a treaty delimiting the boundaries, and Brazil “did not advance beyond the territory that it claimed”, which it already occupied before the war and to which it had a right under the Treaty of Madrid signed in Spain and Portugal – the colonial powers – in 1750.

Doratioto, a professor at the Catholic University in Brasilia, the capital, said Brazil continued the military occupation of Paraguay until 1876, “to prevent the devastated country from being incorporated by Argentina.”

Under the “unequal” conditions in which the 1872 agreement was negotiated, it would not have made sense for Brazilian leaders to bribe Paraguayan arbitrators in order to influence the delimitation of the borders, as one official argued to justify keeping some documents secret, said the historian.

Nor is continued confidentiality justified by the argument that “cruel acts” by Brazilian soldiers must be kept hidden, because they are already public knowledge, he maintained, adding that the only point would be to protect the reputation of historic figures, rather than national interests.

Another historian, Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, said any reports that there are secret documents on the war are just “stories”.

What there may be, he said, are letters from the Duke of Caxias containing harsh criticism of the army, which were kept under reserve for some time but are now available in the national archives, Moniz Bandeira, author of “Brazilian Expansionism and the Formation of States in the La Plata Basin”, remarked to IPS.

Caxias, the patron of the Brazilian army, commanded troops in the last years of the War of the Triple Alliance, after serving as war minister for two terms.

Two diplomats who preferred not to be identified told IPS that there are indeed documents that have been kept secret, but that they are of little importance.

While they could “smear reputations” by revealing “bribes, cruel acts, and small shady deals,” they contain “nothing that would change history,” said one of them, who had access to Brazil’s diplomatic archives.

“They are bureaucratic documents that would disappoint those who are expecting something important,” said the other diplomat, who in the past served in Brazil’s embassy in Asunción, the Paraguayan capital. The records are not available to the public yet, he added, merely because no legal decision has been reached on the matter.

For the same reason, he said, the Paraguayan Academy of History has not yet received a response to its request for access to Brazil’s secret archives, which it made after hearing reports of their possible existence a month ago.

The Brazilian legislature is currently debating a bill to regulate the classification of official documents, and the timeframes for keeping them confidential and opening them up to the public. But it appears that the rules would be limited to records from the recent military dictatorship, which have generated the greatest controversy and pressure.

The leftist government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has created a commission on research and analysis of confidential records, which would classify documents and determine how long they should be kept secret.

But the commission is exclusively made up of members of the government, which compromises its legitimacy, said Doratioto, who argued that it should be expanded to include respected historians and representatives of civil society who are independent of political parties.

The historian said he suspects that the documents from the War of the Triple Alliance were only mentioned “to draw the debate away from a general policy of opening up the archives.”

In his view, it is not only institutions of the state that should make their records available to the public, under criteria and timeframes deemed acceptable by society, but the political forces that opposed the military regime, like communist and other leftist parties, as well.