Salvadorans Ask Justice in Cleric’s 1980 Murder

A somber throng gathered at the Metropolitan Cathedral here Sunday in sorrow and in outrage over an assassination that has remained unsolved for five years.

Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, this troubled country’s top Roman Catholic leader, a champion of peace and human rights, was shot and killed March 24, 1980, as he celebrated a funeral Mass in a hospital chapel.

As has happened with thousands of other Salvadoran slayings blamed on right-wing death squads, no killer has been brought to justice. On Sunday at the cathedral, a memorial Mass was said for Romero, and his successor insisted that justice must be done.

Waiting for Action

“We continue to wait for his death to be cleared up and for the guilty to be punished,” Archbishop Arturo Rivera y Damas said in a homily. The investigation of Romero’s death and the deaths of others “is an indispensable requirement for building peace” in El Salvador.

The cavernous, unadorned and somewhat shabby concrete cathedral overflowed with people. Those who could not squeeze inside stood on the street, and some chanted: “Justice! Justice! Justice!”

“Punishment for the Assassins of Monsignor Romero,” demanded a hand-painted legend on a white sheet. “In the Name of God, Stop the Repression,” several posters said, paraphrasing one of Romero’s last appeals from the pulpit.

Romero had preached insistently against the death squads and against a growing war between the army and Marxist-led guerrillas.

Since the archbishop’s death, the Catholic church has estimated that 50,000 civilians have died in El Salvador’s continuing violence. And Romero’s death has become a popular symbol of the suffering--especially of death-squad killings that have gone unpunished.

Fear of death-squad reprisals, pressure from powerful rightist forces and the impotence of El Salvador’s criminal justice system are all said to help shield the killers.

President Jose Napoleon Duarte, a Christian Democrat who took office in June, pledged to give priority to the investigation of Romero’s assassination. In August, Duarte announced the appointment of a special commission to investigate the Romero case and four other cases of death-squad murders and mass killings.

The commission members’ names have never been made public, and anything the panel may have done has been kept a secret.

“An investigation is being carried out, but they still haven’t had any results,” said Mauricio Pineda, secretary of a separate government commission on human rights.

Msgr. Ricardo Urioste, the vicar general of San Salvador, said he is not aware that the commission is functioning and that he knows of no progress in the Romero case.

‘Tragic Destiny’

“I understand that there are problems--for example, people who could give information are afraid,” Urioste said. “In a way it is part of the tragic destiny of this country, where nothing is found out, nothing is made clear.”

He said that Duarte means well but that he is like many politicians who promise more than they can deliver.

However, U.S. Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering said that “slow and difficult” progress is being made by the commission.

“I don’t want to go into detail, but I can tell you we are working closely with them,” Pickering said Saturday in his embassy office.

The commission depends for money on a special presidential account that has been slashed by the rightist-dominated National Assembly.

“That might be one reason it is not functioning as effectively as it might,” the ambassador added.

The commission also has been the subject of a dispute between the national attorney general’s office and the presidency.

Jose Francisco Guerrero, El Salvador’s attorney general, has threatened a constitutional appeal if the commission usurps his authority over criminal investigations. Under the Salvadoran constitution, the attorney general is appointed by the National Assembly.

Guerrero said in an interview that he has three government attorneys working full-time on the investigation of Romero’s assassination. So far, he said, he has no suspects. “There are no concrete clues,” he added.

The attorney general is a member of the right-wing Arena party. He is a close associate of Roberto D’Aubuisson, head of the party and a former military intelligence officer.

U.S. news media have reported repeated allegations that D’Aubuisson directed death squads and ordered Romero’s assassination. D’Aubuisson repeatedly has denied the allegations.

D’Aubuisson’s accusers include his former boss in a now-defunct national intelligence agency, Col. Roberto Santivanez. Santivanez has given American reporters accounts of alleged involvement by D’Aubuisson and others in Romero’s assassination.

Guerrero said that D’Aubuisson has never been questioned in the case and is not a suspect.

In response to questions, Guerrero said that he would like to obtain a deposition from Santivanez for use in the investigation. Ambassador Pickering said that the embassy would do “everything we could” to help get a deposition if an official request were made.

Lack of Evidence

A criminal court investigation of the Romero killing was closed by Judge Carlos Zamora in November for lack of evidence.

“Every effort was made,” Zamora said in an interview last week. “Not one person was shown to be involved, directly or indirectly, in the death of the monsignor.”

The case could be reopened if new evidence appeared, he said.

Zamora had handled the court’s investigation since October, 1982, succeeding three other judges, each of whom resigned in turn. The first judge on the case quit after unknown gunmen shot up his house, wounding a maid.