Remains of Nun Identified in Argentina

BUENOS AIRES, AUG. 31, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Argentine authorities identified the remains of French nun Léonie Duquet, who disappeared 28 years ago during the military regime.

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The identification of the nun’s remains on Monday, carried out by the Argentine Team of Forensic Anthropology, has a 99% «degree of certainty,» said Judge Horacio Cattani, of the Buenos Aires Federal Chamber on Criminality.

Also buried in the General Lavalle cemetery, and marked «NN,» were the remains of Azucena Villaflor, founder of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, and those of her friends María Ponce and Esther Ballestrino de Careaga.

A religious of the Foreign Missions, congregation based in Toulouse, France, Léonie Duquet worked as a missionary in poor neighborhoods of Buenos Aires.

She was kidnapped on Dec. 10, 1977, when she was 61. She had started to attend meetings of Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, who demanded information about their vanished children.

Judge Cattani said that nothing is yet known of the fate of French nun Alice Domon, who was kidnapped along with Sister Duquet.

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ZENIT Staff

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