An Asunción court this Tuesday sentenced Eusebio Torres Romero, 88, to 30 years in prison. The court highlights the importance of the trial because “it establishes that torture was carried out systematically” during the longest dictatorship in America.

The Paraguayan dictatorship began in 1954 with a coup d'état and would end in 1989 with another. The longevity of the regime was thanks to the support of the United States Government and the sustained and systematic repression it maintained against the population.