Argentina: All's Fair

ARGENTINA

All’s Fair…

It’s a tossup as to whether Argentine leaders are cleaning house or tearing it down.

Earlier this month, a judge in the troubled South American country indicted ex-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and members of her erstwhile administration on charges of treason and called for her arrest.

The New York Times described the development as a “political earthquake.”

Kirchner said the charges were baseless. Since she is a recently elected senator, she enjoys immunity from prosecution. That includes other allegations of money laundering, the Telegraph noted.

But the judge has appealed to Congress to strip her of that protection so he can expose her role in a cover-up related to an Iranian plot in which Hezbollah blew up a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires in 1994, killing 84 and injuring hundreds.

Kirchner allegedly whitewashed Iran’s role in the bombing because she needed Tehran’s financial help to ease the impact of Argentina’s economic slump (which stemmed in part from court fights with American hedge funds after the country defaulted on its debt in 2001).

The subterfuge became a crisis in 2015 when crusading prosecutor Alberto Nisman was found dead in his apartment, a bullet in his head, on the night before he was scheduled to lay out Kirchner’s role in the scheme in testimony to lawmakers.

Kirchner’s former foreign minister, Héctor Timerman, who was among those charged with treason, defended himself in a recent op-ed in the New York Times.

The investigation into the attack was bungled, said Timerman, who suggested the judge was a political opponent of Kirchner who had purposely slowed the bombing probe in the past to protect his allies who were the real culprits. Timerman also rejected accusations that he met with Iran’s foreign minister in Syria and that he asked Interpol to drop so-called “red notices,” or international arrest warrants, on Iranian suspects.

Interpol has corroborated his claims, according to Reuters. Human Rights Watch has blasted the judge’s moves.

The case is likely to wind through the courts, possibly as elections in the coming years rejigger the political landscape and alter the power balances that appear to be driving the case.

In the meantime, current Argentine President Mauricio Macri – who defeated Kirchner’s handpicked successor in 2015 – is pushing forward with his agenda to kickstart the economy. Most recently, the BBC reported, he pushed pension reforms through Congress that will shrink benefits, and include raising the age of retirement. Feeling ripped off, people protested in the streets.

Everyone is battling for what they think is fair. Whoever wins will determine what that means.