Full stop law

[1] It was passed after the government in 1985 had prosecuted men at the top of the military hierarchies in the Trial of the Juntas for crimes committed during the Dirty War against political dissidents.

Several officers were convicted and sentenced; the government's security and military forces had "disappeared" and killed an estimated 15,000-30,000 people.

[2] The law mandated the end of investigation and prosecution of people accused of political violence during the dictatorship and up to the restoration of democratic rule on 10 December 1983.

The first of such cases, against the former Buenos Aires Provincial Police second-in-command Miguel Etchecolatz, ended in September 2006 with his conviction on several counts of kidnapping, torture and murder.

[6] In sentencing him to life imprisonment, the tribunal said that the dictatorship's state terrorism against political dissidents was a form of genocide.