Photo courtesy of CFKArgentina.com
In a declaration published on her official website, President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has raised questions around the death of AMIA prosecutor Alberto Nisman, calling it “the suicide that (I’m convinced) wasn’t suicide”.
Nisman, who was investigating the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish centre, was found in his apartment on Sunday having died from a gunshot wound to the head. He had been due to present his findings to Congress on Monday, days after publicly calling for President Fernández and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman to be questioned over the alleged “criminal plan” to distance Iran from any involvement in the attack.
News of his death led to widespread protests around Argentina, with many accusing the government of having played a role in his death.
The initial autopsy report indicated the death was a suicide, but subsequent forensic tests have not found gunpowder on his hands. Further tests are now underway. Prosecutor Vivian Fein, who is leading the investigation into Nisman’s death, said that this could be simply due to the calibre of the gun, and does not necessarily mean Nisman did not pull the trigger. In a press statement this morning, Fein confirmed that the death has been classified as “suspicious” and asked for collaboration from the press to get to the bottom of “who is who”.
Yesterday, Nisman’s full 300-page report into the 1994 attack was released to the judge.
The Intelligence Secretariat responded to the report by denying that two of the intelligence agents listed – Héctor Yrimia and Ramón Allan Héctor Bogado – were members of the agency.
In her statement, President Fernández said: “False information was planted in Nisman’s report”, adding “they used him when he was alive, and then they needed him dead. It’s that sad and terrible.”
She added: “Nisman’s accusation not only crumbles, but it becomes a real political and judicial scandal. Prosecutor Nisman did not know that the intelligence agents that he listed as such, were not. Least of all that one of them had been accused by (ex intelligence chief ‘Jaime’) Stiusso himself.”
She went on to question the role Stiusso could have played in the providing the information.
“Today I don’t have any proof, but I also don’t have any doubts,” she continued, before asking: “Why would he kill himself if he did not know that the information in his report was false? These are answers that only those who gave him false information and convinced him that he had ‘the case of the century’ in his hands can answer.”
This morning, Fein said that she had no plans to call Stiusso to make a statement at present.
The post President ‘Convinced’ Nisman Death not a Suicide appeared first on The Argentina Independent.