The most uncomfortable trial for Cristina Kirchner goes ahead: the pact with Iran

Five years ago, prosecutor Alberto Nisman denounced Cristina for signing the pact with Iran. After repeated refusals, the case was investigated, and on March 5, 2018, the late judge Claudio Bonadio referred the case to oral trial. Federal Oral Court 8 (TOF 8) awarded the trial, called a preliminary hearing on December 14. The case which has among its main accused the vice-president, it will welcome a total of 300 witnesses during the oral debate. Judicial sources, indicated Bugle who await the start of the debate for the first half of next year marked by the legislative elections.

The preliminary hearing will take place on December 14, “for the sole purpose of ordering the evidence that will be produced during the debate (dates of hearings, schedules, schedule of witnesses, number of witnesses per hearing, etc.), by informing the parties that, during said hearing , no, they will admit proposals or exceptions outside this agenda, “TOF 8 reported in September. Everything is heading towards the start of the debate, which is two years behind schedule.

This is the most internationally important trial against Vice-President Cristina Kirchner. In this oral trial, the alleged attempt to cover up the five Iranian defendants accused of having been the intellectual authors of the attack on AMIA by signing the memorandum of understanding with Iran, which the late prosecutor Alberto Nisman denounced in 2015. The attack was carried out by an Islamic Jihad command of Hezbollah from Lebanon.

The case filed two years ago in TOF 8 has experienced several delays. Senator Oscar Parrilli, one of the accused, requested that the proceedings be set aside. He did so after Ana María Figueroa, one of the judges involved in the case, revealed that she had come under pressure from the executive branch during the administration of Mauricio Macri. Carlos Zannini’s lawyer, Mariano Fragueiro Frías, has also called for his lawsuits to be quashed and the case to be tried.

During the analysis of the situation, the prosecutor before the TOF 8, Marcelo Colombo, rejected Zannini’s arguments, and it was he who urged the judges to move forward towards the start of the oral debate. He maintained that the importance of the investigated facts “obliges the debate to move forward quickly so that it is there, with the publicity and the extent of the evidence that this step guarantees, that the charges will be definitively resolved”.

With regard to procedural delays, the judges recalled that they constituted an assembled court, “where each of the judges intervenes in numerous trials, both in their jurisdictions of origin and in others where they provide for subrogation; that on countless occasions since the judgment of this For this reason, we have asked the respective authorities to provide both material and human resources, which have not been addressed. “

Faced with this scenario, they have decided to order additional evidence “which will only partially contribute to the enormous task that we must undertake.” However, we must strive to advance the procedural guidelines necessary to achieve what the Office of the Prosecutor itself demands: the earliest holding of the oral and public debate which enables the accused to settle his responsibilities vis-à-vis- vis-à-vis the law and society and victims to finally find a judicial response to their demands “.

The Court is still awaiting appeals which, on several occasions, have requested the Supreme Court of Justice, which has not yet responded. Judges believe that due to the size of the case, and TOF training requires more staff to process the next instance.

After the preliminary hearing to be held in two weeks, TOF 8 as the prosecutor in charge of Colombo, is looking to give momentum to the case and it is expected that, according to judicial sources, the oral debate begins in the first semester of next year.

In 2021, the year of legislative elections, Cristina Kirchner will continue to face the trial for alleged corruption in public works, where she is accused of being the head of an illicit association which launched 51 calls for tenders in favor of Lázaro Báez, who was her business partner. But at the same time, the TOF 5 estimates that in the second half of the year, the trial against the vice-president and her two children, Máximo and Florencia Kirchner, could begin for money laundering.

In the case of TOF 8, estimates indicate that it could be in the first half of the year that the investigative debate that began with the complaint by prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who a few days later was found lifeless in the room. bath of its department of Puerto. Newspaper. The judge in another case ruled that the former head of the UFI-AMIA had been the victim of a homicide and that it was necessary to investigate to find out if this was related to his complaint.

TOF 8 has convened a statement of prior testimony via videoconference to former Interpol Director Ronald Noble for October 5 and his deputy, Joel Sollier, for October 19, who reside in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Republic of France, at the request of the Attorney General of the Treasury, Carlos Zannini. But the statement was postponed.

The trial of relatives killed in the 1994 attack, represented by Tomás Farini Duggan, analyzes the possibility of asking the Federal Criminal Cassation Chamber to annul Noble’s testimony, since in the part of the case that is still in the hands Judge Marcelo Martínez Di Giorgi, the former Interpol chief, is accused of allegedly collaborating in the maneuver in favor of five Iranian officials.

The accusation

On December 7, 2017, Judge Bonadio requested the violation and preventive detention of former President Cristina Kirchner. At that time, she was prosecuted for treason, aggravated cover-up and obstruction of a functional act, all linked to the pact with Iran as a suspected benefit to those accused of the AMIA attack. According to justice, Cristina and several of its officials devised a “criminal plan” to “ensure impunity” to the Iranians responsible for the explosion of the Jewish mutual.

For justice, The purpose of the pact with Iran was that Iranian citizens accused of the terrorist attack “can escape the action of justice. – by granting Interpol enough tools so that the red index notifications which weighed on Iranian citizens lose their virtuality ”. Thus, they were freed from “all criminal responsibility for said events – by the creation of a Truth Commission – and thereby introduce an alternative hypothesis”.

The accused are Cristina Kirchner, Eduardo Zuain, Oscar Parrilli, Carlos Zannini, Angelina Abbona, Juan Martín Mena, Andrés Larroque, Jorge Khalil, Luis D’Elía and Fernando Esteche. The late former Chancellor Héctor Timerman has also been prosecuted.