4 High Salvador Officers Called Kidnaping Suspects

Four high-ranking Salvadoran army officers are among people being investigated as suspected members of a kidnaping ring that abducted members of El Salvador’s wealthy families for ransoms totaling several million dollars, sources close to the case said Sunday.

The sources, asking not to be identified by name, said they believe the armed forces high command is willing, for the first time, to see active-duty commissioned officers arrested and prosecuted for kidnaping because of pressure from well-to-do families whose interests the military has traditionally protected.

They also say that the top military leaders, who may in the past have closed their eyes to political crimes committed by armed forces officers in their war against leftist guerrillas here, are likely to find kidnaping-for-profit “vulgar.”

A source close to the case said that the military officers as well as the civilians under investigation have all had close ties with Roberto D’Aubuisson. He is a retired intelligence service officer and former leader of the rightist Arena party whom U.S. officials have accused of links with past activities of right-wing death squads.

One source who asked not to be identified for reasons of personal security said, “All of these (under investigation) are people who have been popularly identified with the death squads.”

In the early 1980s, thousands of students, peasants, religious workers, labor and leftist political leaders were killed or disappeared, their fates blamed on rightist paramilitary groups believed to have been linked to the military. No commissioned officer ever has been tried for a political crime here.

President Jose Napoleon Duarte declined to comment Sunday on reports that high-ranking officers are now suspected of complicity in the kidnaping ring.

“I cannot answer that question; this is not the opportune moment,” Duarte told reporters at his home. “But I can assure you that I have made the decision to investigate this to the end, no matter who turns out to be involved.”

A source close to the case said that investigators are still seeking evidence to press charges against the officers and that he expects to see more arrests soon.

Last week, authorities announced the arrest of two people in the investigation, including former Lt. Rodolfo Lopez Sibrian, a one-time National Guard intelligence officer who was implicated in the machine-gun slaying of two American labor advisers and a Salvadoran land reform official at the Sheraton Hotel here in 1981.

The U.S. Embassy had long sought prosecution of Lopez Sibrian in the labor advisers’ case, but he was never brought to trial--in part, it is believed, because of pressure from the armed forces, which uphold a code of protecting their own members and their reputation as an institution.

Police also hold Lopez Sibrian’s father-in-law, Orlando Llovera Ballete, a furniture manufacturer, rancher and member of a well-known family that has been active in the Arena party.

Sources close to the case said they believe the ring is responsible for at least five kidnapings in the last several years, abductions that netted several million dollars in ransoms. The sources stressed that the kidnapings were carried out for profit, not for political reasons, although the kidnapers staged several of them to look as if they had been committed by guerrillas of the leftist Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front that is battling Duarte’s government in the countryside.

Authorities also said last week that they were seeking evidence to prosecute Antonio Cornejo Arango, a former member of Arena’s executive board, and a second former lieutenant, whom they identified as Carlos Zacapa. A source close to the case said both were believed to have fled the country.

Lt. Zacapa is a cousin of Col. Joaquin Eduardo Zacapa, who also is out of the country on a pre-scheduled vacation, a military source said. This source added that there is speculation in the military that the colonel is under investigation “and may not return from vacation.”

Sources close to the case said that many of the kidnaping suspects are from “families with money,” some of them friends or acquaintances of the kidnap victims. As many as 20 civilians and military people are being investigated, the sources said.

Duarte said that the government and representatives of the private sector formed a commission late last year to begin looking into the problem of kidnapings here, of which there have been at least 75 major cases since the early 1970s. Many of the early abductions were carried out by leftist guerrilla bands, which in the 1970s obtained funds by kidnaping and robbery.

A source from the business community said that the kidnapings were causing well-to-do people to move their families and money out of the country. He said there was suspicion among the well-to-do that some wealthy rightists were involved in the kidnapings and that there has been a climate of terror among them.

“The enemy is within,” he said. “The enemy could be seated next to you, not just in the mountains (with the guerrillas).”

The current investigation, which began early this year, has been headed by Col. Carlos R. Lopez Nuila, vice minister of defense and public security. Technicians from a U.S.-trained and -funded Special Investigative Commission have been working on the case, and U.S. authorities have provided technical assistance, sources close to the case said.

“The investigation is so extensive that it could reach all levels of any military or political institution in the country,” one source said.

Several military and wealthy civilian sources said they believe the armed forces will not raise objections to the prosecution of commissioned officers accused of taking part in kidnapings.

“This is not only a vulgar act, but treason against the country,” one source said. “While we are all crying over our dead, they are provoking treasonous blows.”

Another source said, “Whoever is named in this will find himself alone.”