Brazil panel sworn in to probe dictatorship abuses [View all]
An emotional President Dilma Rousseff, a former leftist guerrilla jailed and tortured during Brazil's 1964-1985 military dictatorship, on Wednesday swore in a seven-member Truth Commission tasked with probing human rights abuses from that period.
"Brazil deserves the truth, the new generations deserve the truth and above all, those who lost friends and relatives and who continue to suffer as if they were dying again each day deserve the truth," she said, choking back tears as she mentioned names of relatives of the victims.
Also attending the solemn ceremony at the presidential palace were all of Rousseff's living predecessors: Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010); Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995-2002); Fernando Collor de Mello (1990-92); and Jose Sarney (1985-90), who also is the current Senate speaker.
Over the next two years, the truth panel will probe politically-motivated abductions, rights abuses and murders perpetrated from 1946 to 1988, a time span exceeding the dictatorship.
But a 1979 amnesty law for those who carried out the dictatorship-era crimes was upheld by the Brazilian Supreme Court in 2010 and remains in effect.
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