Top government officials rallied behind Argentina's President Cristina Fernandez on Saturday after a state prosecutor said he would keep investigating accusations that she tried to cover up Iran's alleged involvement in a 1994 bombing. The allegations have plunged Fernandez's last year in office into turmoil at a time her leftist government is already grappling with an economy teetering on the brink of recession.
On Friday, state investigator Gerardo Pollicita formally reiterated the accusations levelled against Fernandez a month ago by his colleague Alberto Nisman. Nisman was found dead, with a single bullet in his head, on January 18, a day before he was to detail further evidence for his accusations to Congress. Fernandez has denounced the accusations she conspired to whitewash Nisman's findings in return for economic favours from Iran as "absurd." Her ministers have said his case was flawed and part of an opposition plot to unseat the president.
Anibal Fernandez, the president's chief of staff, said Pollicita had merely regurgitated Nisman's claims in his own 60-page document released on Friday. "They haven't managed to stand any of it up," Anibal Fernandez, who is not related to the president, told Radio 10. "The first 50 pages are 'copy paste' from the heap that Nisman presented." Another senior official, Cabinet Chief Jorge Capitanich called the case "an ongoing legal coup."
If a judge decides there is enough evidence to proceed with the case, the investigation could lead to a trial. For Fernandez to be arrested while in office, Congress, which is dominated by Fernandez's allies, would have to lift her immunity. The judge assigned to the case was returning early from his vacations in neighbouring Uruguay, local media reported.