ARGENTINA:A kidnapping or a political stunt? The question is reverberating in the mysterious case of Luis Gerez, a witness in a human rights trial who went missing last month and reappeared two days later, shirtless and in shock, saying he had been kidnapped, tied up, beaten and burned with cigarettes.
The case has raised troubling questions in a nation still torn by memories of a brutal military dictatorship that ended almost a quarter of a century ago, leaving as many as 30,000 people dead or "disappeared".
Many had hoped that kidnappings as a means of political coercion were a thing of the past.
In a nation inured to political skulduggery, denial and disinformation, the disappearance and re-emergence of Mr Gerez has spawned sinister theories.
Most centre on the actions of President Nestor Kirchner, who has made punishing past military abusers a focus of his administration, and who intervened directly in the case.
Mr Gerez, whose testimony in 2005 about being tortured during the dictatorship helped banish a powerful former police official from Congress, said he was abducted on December 27th while walking to a shop near his home north of the capital. He said men forced him into a vehicle and drove him to a warehouse or a shed, where he was kept hooded.
"I thought they were going to kill me," he told investigators.
The incident came a few months after the unsolved disappearance in September of another human rights figure, Jorge Julio Lopez, whose testimony last year helped send a former provincial police chief to jail for life. Mr Lopez has been called the first "desaparecido", or disappeared, since the return of democracy to Argentina. Police fear he was killed. He, like Mr Gerez, was a construction worker and one-time left-wing activist.
The disappearance of Mr Gerez (51) apparently so alarmed Mr Kirchner that he took the unusual step of going on television and radio on December 29th to denounce it. The president blamed "paramilitary and parapolitical elements" for the disappearance. Less than an hour later, Mr Gerez reappeared on a suburban street in the neighbourhood where he said he had been kidnapped. He was dazed but in good health. "Mr President, I owe you my life," he told local media.
Gleeful presidential aides said Mr Kirchner's words had unnerved the kidnappers. The political exploitation was too much for an opposition scrambling to find an alternative to Mr Kirchner in national elections scheduled for this year.
Critics suggested the incident was staged to enhance his carefully crafted crusader image, where he has pushed to nullify amnesties given to suspects from the former dictatorship's "dirty war" against perceived enemies.
"A fabrication," said former president Carlos Menem, a fierce Kirchner rival from the right.
A leftist congresswoman, Elisa Carrio, accused Mr Kirchner of lying. Others have suggested that the president's underlings might have faked the episode without his knowledge.
Mr Kirchner "was sold a novel and he bought it, and now he has to take the responsibility for that", said Luis Patti, a retired police inspector. It is not lost on observers that Mr Patti may have a grudge to bear.
In congressional testimony in 2005, Mr Gerez identified Mr Patti as a torturer, prompting lawmakers to deny the latter a congressional seat he had won at the ballot box. Now a powerful right-wing political figure, Mr Patti became a suspect in Mr Gerez's alleged disappearance. He denied any connection.
Mr Kirchner's aides have strongly denied that Mr Gerez's abduction was staged. Prosecutors say his story is supported by physical indications he had been tied and abused, and evidence of psychological trauma.