US policy in the age of the "soft coup" in Latin America

In the grand scheme of things, it's hard not to think that removing elected governments by a "soft coup" like those in Paraguay in 2013 and in Brazil 2016 is preferable to the military brand of coup, of which Brazil 1964, Chile 1973 and Argentina 1976 are some of the more dramatic recent examples.

Honduras 2009 is sometimes cited as an example of the "soft coup." But it took the form of a military coup, though civilian government was quickly restored. And even obvious military coups also have a significant civilian political component. The Argentine coup of 1976 is also referred to commonly as a civilian-military coup. Just as the 1955 Argentine coup that styled itself the Revolución Libertadora involved substantial involvement at all stages from the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR) and the Socialist and Communist Parties.

And even the famous nonviolent "regime change" operation promoted by the CIA in Iran and 1953 and Guatemala in 1954 had long-range effects that call into serious question the judgment of the Eisenhower Administration promoting those coups against what in retrospect were, at worst, mildly annoying regimes for Washington. The quick-and-easy coup in Honduras has left an ugly legacy of social violence that continues over five years later. (Thelma Mejía, Journalism in Honduras Trapped in Violence Inter Press Service 11/28/2016)Latin America in 2016: The Resurgence of the Right Continues The Real News 12/31/2016:

Latin America in 2016: The Resurgence of the Right Continues (2/2) 01/02/2017:

Emire Sader describes in Macri, Temer y Peña Nieto, huérfanos de Clinton Página/12 25.11.2016 the Obama-Clinton policy in effect in Latin America. Despite the pragmatic opening to Cuba, the Obama Administration's policy toward Latin America has been fundamentally conservative. Conservative in the sense of supporting conservative government's with less than enthusiastic commitments to democracy over democratic governments committed to progressive economic policies instead of the neoliberalism demanded by the Washington Consensus.

The Obama Administration supported the military coup that ousted Honduras' elected government in 2011 and the "soft coup" of 2013 in Paraguay, which was down by means of a cynically politicized impeachment of President Fernando Lugo, a supporter of liberation theology who was the candidate of the center-right Liberal Party. The hard right Colorado Party had not lost a national election since 1947, a period that included the dictatorship of Alfredo Stroessner during 1954–89.

Argentina elected Mauricio Macri President in 2015. He ran at the head of an electoral alliance called Cambiemos, which primarily consisted of Macri's own PRO party and the UCR, the latter party commonly referred to as "the radicals," although they have been a conservative oligarchic party for decades, arguably since 1945 and certainly since 1955.

In 2016, Dilma Rousseff was ousted from the Presidency by an utterly cynical impeachment with no basis that could be considered legitimate for a democracy. The new President, Michel Temer, isn't actually eligible to run for elected office in Brazil as part of his penalty on a corruption conviction. The "soft coup" impeachment against Dilma makes the frivolous impeachment of Bill Clinton by a rabidly partisan Republican House in the US in the 1990s look like a model of legal and democratic conduct.

Sader writes that Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State was responsible for:

la destrucción del gobierno de Manuel Zelaya en Honduras, después de que el último intento de golpe militar clásico en Venezuela, en 2002, hubiera fracasado. Ella y su gobierno apoyaron el golpe en contra de Fernando Lugo, que siguió el mismo guión, así como Hillary y Obama se callaron, de forma cómplice, frente al golpe en Brasil.

[the destruction of Manuel Zelaya's government in Honduras, after the previous attempt at a classic military coup in Venezuela in 2002 had failed. {The 2002 coup attempt was crassly supported by the Cheney-Bush Administrtion.} She and her go0vernment supported the {soft} coup against Fernando Lugo that followed the same guide, just as Hillary and Obama were silent in a complicit form in face of the {soft} coup in Brazil.]

Obama also made his first Presidential trip to Argentina in 2016 to show his support for the rightwing government of Mauricio Macri and "y anunciar una nueva época en las relaciones entre los dos gobiernos, felicitando al presidente argentino por los primeros pasos dados en dirección del viejo modelo neoliberal." ("to announce a new era in the relations between the two governments, congratualting the Argentine President for the first steps taken in the direction of the old neoliberal model.")

Sader sees the Obama-Clinton strategy in Latin America as being based around using the committed neoliberal government of Enrique Peña Nieto in Mexico with the heavyweight Brazil-Argentina combination to impose the neoliberal model onto recalcitrant governments and electorates like those in Bolivia, Ecuador and (of course!) Venezuela. But he notes that the Trump Family Business Administration's likely hostility to Mexico in particular could complicate this plan. "México entró en pánico con la elección de Trump y sus amenazas. De nada sirvió la grotesta invitación que hizo Peña Nieto a que lo visitara, con efectos negativos para la imagen del ya desgastado presidente mexicano." ("Mexico went into a panic over the election of Trump and his threats. The grotesque invitation that Peña Nieto made for him to visit was useless, with negative effective for the already eroded image of the Mexican President.") He also notes that if Trump carries through on his campaign skepticism about corporate-deregulation trade treaties, it could complicate the plans of the current Argentine and Brazilian government to forge a relationship to the United States as subordinate as that of Mexico, in Sader's formulation.

Part of the plan presumably favored by the Obama Administration and being implemented by the Macri and Temer governments was a weakening of the South American trade alliance Mercosur. (Alberto Müller, Erosionar la integración Página/12 24.12.2016) Mercosur has functioned under the leadership of the so-called "Pink Tide" left-leaning governments of the last decade or so as an institution representing continental cooperation among South American government to establish independent regional power and influence against the neoliberal agenda. It has functioned in some of the spirit of the Patria Grande thinkers who encourage such regional cooperation against imperialist influences.

The Administration of current Argentine President Mauricio Macri, currently busily making friends with the American President-elect, has been giving Argentina and the world a textbook example of the damage neoliberal economic policies can do since taking office in December 2015. (GDP falls 3.8% in third quarter as investment remains elusive Buenos Aires Herald 12/23/2016; Leandro Renou, ‘The lower middle classes are heavily reducing consumption’ Buenos Aires Herald 12/23/2016)

His government is the kind that left nationalists in Argentina refer to as capayo (sepoy), referring to politicians and governments that are subservient to foreign interests, particularly economic interest. (It's not meant as a compliment!)

Even during the left-Peronist governments of Néstor Kirchner and Cristina Fernández (2003-2009), the conservative opposition kept up a steady stream of accusations of massive corruption and authoritarian tendencies, most of them with little or no real content.

The Macri regime is trying to use such accusation now against Cristina and her Partido Justicialista (PJ) and well as the social movements and groups that are a critical part of the kirchnerista base. The case of activist Milagro Sala has received attention from international human rights groups. "The U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention ruled in October [2016] that her detention was arbitrary and ordered Argentina's government to free her immediately. However, the Macri administration considered the decision non-binding." (Argentina Human Rights Hero Milagro Sala Sentenced to 3 Years TeleSur 12/28/2016; Sala receives first sentence Buenos Aires Herald 12/30/2016)

See also:

Edgardo Mocca, El caso Milagro Sala Página/12 04.12.2016
Cruces en el massismo por Milagro Sala Página/12 02.01.2017
Luis Bruschtein, Milagros demonizados Página/12 02.01.2017

Macri's government is also going after former President Cristina Fernández on a corruption charge that looks contrived. And on another charge, with which I'm far more familiar and which is about as bogus as they come.

The courts have brought a formal indictment against her on the former charge. (In second push, CFK indicted for public works graft Buenos Aires Herald 12/30/2016)

The other charge is a revival of a case that former prosecutor Alberto Nisman tried to bring against her over her handling of the still-ongoing investigation into the 1994 AMIA bombing in Buenos Aires. I blogged about this back in 2015 as the original case was unfolding. The case is ludicrous. Very short version: Nisman was accusing her of doing something that wasn't illegal and for which there is no good evidence she did and very substantial material in the public record to show she did not do it. Nisman himself died of a gunshot wound that by all publicly known indications was a suicide, although the official investigation is still open. But at the time of the likely suicide, his case against the then-President was rapidly coming apart publicly, which could have been a contributing cause of the suicide. (Nisman AMIA complaint against CFK re-opened Buenos Aires Herald 12/30/2016; A history of the judicial back and forth, almost two years in the making Buenos Aires Herald 12/30/2016)

Other articles on the Nisman charge include the following, some of which show signs of the many uses to which the AMIA case has been put, not least because it's a key part of the American claim that Iran has an advanced ability to project substantial terrorist action in the Western Hemisphere, although lots has changed in 24 years. The case itself has never been solved, though Argentina's official theory of the case is that Iran was behind it. And Cristina herself pursued that theory as President. She was aggressive as a Senator in pursuing the investigation into the attack. For background, see The Unsolved Terror Attack At The Center Of Argentina’s Political Crisis World Post 01/30/2015.

Argentine court rules ex-president may have covered up Iranian bombing of Jewish center Jewish Telegraph Agency 12/30/2016; this is actually a poor report on the charge
Argentine ex-president Kirchner faces new probe over bombing AFP/Yahoo! News ; the headline does not reflect the report and looks purely propagandistic. The article itself reports, "Four lower courts had thrown the case out on grounds there was no evidence a crime had been committed."
“Es el uso y abuso de los muertos de la AMIA” Página/12 30.12.2016
Excusaciones y recusaciones Página/12 11.11.2016

Aljazeera also features a sloppy report on Cristina's situation, taking the conservative government's highly politicized accusations of Macri's conservative government, Former Argentine president Cristina Kirchner faces court 01/01/2017. One of the people this report quotes is Marioano Obarrio, identified only as a "journalist." That's true. He's a journalist for La Nación, the rightwing government which has repeatedly over the decades supported military governments and has been the journalistic voice for the Argentine oligarchy since it was founded by former President Bartolomé Mitre in 1870. (Except for a period during Juan Perón's first government when the paper was seized by the government.

It's concerning to see Aljazeera presenting a report made with such credulity to rightwing charges that one would have to be very generous to describe as highly questionable. So far, they look downright frivolous.

Argentine Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman and the AMIA/Nisman/vulture-funds tangle

Raúl Kollmann in “Ellos dicen culpables sí, juicio no” Página/12 29.04.2015 reports on the resignation of Argentine Héctor Timerman from the Jewish organization AMIA and explains the immediate background of his decision:

La renuncia de Timerman es a la AMIA, la mutual a la que están afiliados una parte de los integrantes de la comunidad judía. La AMIA administra los cementerios, la red educativa, algunos comedores, la asistencia social, el respaldo a personas de la tercera edad y muchas actividades culturales. Los socios de la AMIA votan su comisión directiva, hoy en día en manos de los sectores más religiosos y ortodoxos. Al mismo tiempo, para las cuestiones políticas se supone que la representación está en la DAIA, donde convergen las instituciones (entre ellas la AMIA), los templos, las escuelas, los clubes. Cuando se elige la conducción de la DAIA, las instituciones y clubes con más socios tienen varios votos: la AMIA, por ejemplo, tiene cuatro de los 120 totales. Con la carta de renuncia dirigida a Leonardo Jmelnitzky, actual presidente de la AMIA, Timerman quiso dejar en claro que no quiere ser representado por la conducción de la AMIA y tampoco por la DAIA.

En las últimas semanas surgió un grupo importante de integrantes de la comunidad judía que concretaron la primera convocatoria de judíos progresistas que no se sienten representados por la AMIA y la DAIA. El ex director ejecutivo de la DAIA Jorge Elbaum produjo una enorme repercusión con dos notas publicadas por Página/12 en las que mostraba y testificaba sobre las presiones que recibió la DAIA para bloquear el memorándum con Irán. Se alinearon voceros del PRO, de las embajadas de Estados Unidos e Israel y, enseguida, las fundaciones financiadas por los fondos buitre, en especial por Paul Singer. El propio fiscal Nisman se movió activamente como “amigo” de la Fundación para la Defensa de la Democracia, también financiada por Singer. Todas estas movidas fueron rechazadas en el plenario de argentinos de origen judío, que tuvo la conducción de la periodista Miriam Lewin ....

[Timerman's resignation is directed to the AMIA, the mutual society to which a part of the members of the Jewish community are affiliated. The AMIA administers the cemeteries, the educational network, some dining facilties, social assistance, support for the elderly and many cultural activities. The members of AMIA vote for their board of directors, these days in the hands of the most religious and orthodox sectors. At the same time, for political questions the representations is assumed to be in the DAIA, where the institutions converge (among them AMIA), the temples, the schools, the clubs. When the leadership of the DAIA is decided, the institutions and clubs with the most members have various votes: AMIA, for instance, has four of the 120 total. With the letter of resignation directed to Leonardo Jmelnitzky, current President of the AMIA, Timerman wants to make it clear that he doesn't wish to be represented by the leadership of the AMIA nor by the DAIA.

In recent weeks, an important group of progressive members of the Jewish community has emerged that constituted the first announcement by progressive Jews who do not feel themselves represented by the AMIA and the DAIA. The ex-Executive Director of the DAIA Jorge Elbaum produced an enormous repercussion with two notes published by Página/12 in which he demonstrates and testifies about the pressure the DAIA received to block the memorandum on Iran. Spokespeople aligned from the PRO, the embassies of the United States and Israel and, promptly, the foundations financed by the vulture funds, particularly by Paul Singer. Prosecutor Nisman himself actively behaved as "a friend" of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, also financed by Singer. All of these moves were rejected by the plenary session of [the progressive group] of Argentines of Jewish origin, which was lead by the journalist Miriam Lewin. ...]

A sidebar article reports on the left-leaning group of dissenters from the AMIA/DAIA positions, Un foro “colectivo y democrático” Página/12 29.04.2015.

Kollmann further reports:

En su diálogo con este diario, Timerman contó los intercambios con los dirigentes comunitarios sobre el memorándum. “Nosotros les dijimos que era un paso adelante, como lo sostuvieron Interpol o Amnesty International. Era intentar destrabar la situación y juzgar a los sospechosos, que Irán no iba a extraditar. Ellos dijeron que sí al principio y después que no. La Presidenta les ofreció que traigan una idea alternativa. Y no trajeron nada, salvo la posibilidad de reformar la Constitución para juzgar en ausencia, algo que en la Argentina nunca se hizo. Por eso insisto en el texto que ellos, los dirigentes de la comunidad judía, no quieren avanzar en buscar formas de juzgar a los sospechosos. Ellos dicen culpables sí, juicio no.”

[In his conversation with this paper, Timerman recounted the exchanges with the community leaders about the memorandum {the agreement with Iran}. "We told them that it was a step forward, as Interpol or Amnesty International maintained. It was intended to unfetter the situation and try the suspects that Iran had not extradicted. They said yes at first and later no. The President {Cristina Fernández} invited them to bring an alternative idea. And they didn't come up with anything, except the possibility of reforming the Constitution to allow a trial in absentia, something that has never been done in Argentina. For that reason, I insisted in the text {of the resignation letter} that they, the leaders of the Jewish community, did not want to have progress in looking for forms of trying the suspects. They are saying guilty yes, trial no."]]

As I've commented on here numerous times, the AMIA case has become deeply involved in efforts by American neoconservatives, the Government of Israel and the Republican Party to get up a war with Iran. Paul Singer is one of the biggest donors to the Republican Party, whose enthusiasm for the Likud Party of Israel's warlike policies he apparently shares. He's also a supporter of neocon policies and is engaged in a landmark legal dispute with Argentina over "vulture fund" investments in defaulted Argentine bonds. And all of this has become embedded into differences of priorities and outlook within Argentina's Jewish community and with the partisan opposition to Cristina's government and her Peronist Justicialista Party.

The Washington Post, whose editorial stance has been staunchly neoconservative for years, in a recent editorial accused Cristina and her government of promoting anti-Semitism in defending itself over the Nisman/AMIA case, Argentina’s president resorts to anti-Semitic conspiracy theories 04/23/2015. From everything I can see, this is a ludicrous accusation.

Jim Lobe and Charles Davis respond specifically to the WaPo editorial in Following the Money: The New Anti-Semitism? LobeLog Foreign Policy 05/01/2015.

Obviously, Foreign Minister Timerman is Jewish, as is Cristina's Economics Minister Axel Kicillof. Those are the two most prominent ministers of her Cabinet on the international scene.

On these themes, see also:

Charles Davis, U.S. Hedge Funds Paint Argentina as Ally of Iranian ‘Devil’ – Part One Inter Press Service 07/29/2013

Charles Davis, U.S. Hedge Funds Paint Argentina as Ally of Iranian ‘Devil’ – Part Two Inter Press Service 07/31/2013

Graciela Mochkofsky, Why Alberto Nisman Is No Hero for Argentina — or the Jews The Forward 03/10/2015, who gives this summary of Nisman's background:

In 1997, when he first became involved in the case — known in Argentina by the JCC’s acronym, AMIA — Nisman was a young and ambitious prosecutor making a career in the newly inaugurated system of open trials.

His task was to make presentable the fabrication concocted by Judge Juan José Galeano. With forged evidence, Galeano and other authorities had accused a ring of corrupt police officers of being the “local connection” in the bombing.

The open trial began in 2001 and ended in disaster in 2004. The forgery was so apparent that it didn’t survive scrutiny. The policemen were exonerated. The judge, the prosecutors, the head of the intelligence service, a high-ranking police officer, former president Carlos Menem and the leader of the main political Jewish organization were eventually indicted for the cover-up (and are going to trial in a few months). Nisman somehow survived, and President Néstor Kirchner (Cristina Kirchner’s now late husband, who took office in 2007) appointed him as special prosecutor for the AMIA case. He had to rebuild it from scratch. In 2006, based mostly on foreign intelligence reports, Nisman accused the Iranians of sponsoring the attack, allegedly carried out by Hezbollah militants.

The tangled AMIA/Nisman case

Argentine President Cristina Fernández at her webpage reprinted this article that reports on connections between the (probable) suicide of prosecutor Alberto Nisman, the AMIA case and the vulture funds trying to drive Argentina into bankruptcy: Jorge Elbaum, Buitres, Nisman, DAIA: la ruta del dinero Página/12 18.04.2015.

And apparently her office liked it some much they decided to publish their own English translation, Vulture funds, Nisman, DAIA: The money trail 19.04.2015. Nisman's link to hedge/vulture fund magnate Paul Singer, who is also one of the largest contributors to the US Republican Party, according to this report was closer than previously known publicly:

July 2nd 2013, ATFA, funded mostly by Paul Singer, president of NML Elliott, published an advertisement titled “Shameful allies”, that shows a picture of president Cristina Fernández close to the, at that moment, persian [sic] president Mahmud Ahmadinejad. In catastrophe fashion the ad reads:“Time has come the time to stop Argentina from breaking American and international law”. June 16th 2014, the Supreme Court of the United States of America decides not to take the case of Argentina’s debt, giving free way to the Judge Griesa to continue protecting the international speculative funds.

July 9th 2013, republican Jeff Duncan, responsible for the Homeland Security Committee of the House of Representatives (who received the “contribution” of US$10 thousand from the Political Action Committee of the organization “Each Republican is Crucial”, funded by Paul Singer, in September 2012), sent a letter to President Cristina Fernández, claiming that he was disappointed by the decision of Attorney General, Gils Carbó, of not allowing Nisman “come forward” before the Capitol.

Two days after the letter was sent to the President, Duncan sent another missive to Secretary of State John Kerry with the warning that “Argentina may be trying to support Iran’s illegal nuclear program” and demands that Kerry consider possible ties between Fernandez’ government and “the greatest world sponsor of terrorism”. Around the same time, Republican Senator for Illinois Mark Kirk sent yet another letter to President Kirchner questioning her dealing with Iran. Postage of this missive and other large expenses of the Senator were financed by Paul Singer through a USD 95.000 donation, according to the International Press Service’s report from August 7th 2013, quoting the Center for Responsive Politics, an organization that monitors political donations in the USA.

Two days after these three letters were sent, prosecutor Nisman began a round of meetings with the heads of the Jewish organizations DAIA and AMIA in which they agreed steps to prevent the implementation of the memorandum with Iran. During these meetings, which took place in a coffee shop on 1601 Juana Manso St. in Puerto Madero (Buenos Aires), Nisman fervently repeated that he was willing to put money “out of his own pocket” to help DAIA destroy the memorandum. “If necessary, Paul Singer will help us”, he declared to his astonished café companions. [emphasis in the English translation]

Cristina also made her own statement taking off from the news report (CFK warns about 'global modus operandi' against 'sovereign nations' Buenos Aires Herald 04/19/2015):

President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has warned about a “global political operation” that threatens “sovereign nations,” following an article published in Pagina12 newspaper that links the so called “vulture funds” with late AMIA special prosecutor Alberto Nisman, the DAIA Jewish organization, and the political opposition’s rejection of the Iran memorandum. ...

Based on the article, CFK questioned local journalists that put pressure on AMIA and DAIA to oppose the Iran pact, and criticized the way Singer funds lobby groups disguised as NGOs that operate to influence international politics. She also recalled these NGO “hired Argentine politicians” to spread their views.

“We are in front of a global modus operandi that not only damages sovereign nations, interfering and coercing different branches of government, but also generates international political operations of several kinds,” she said in a Facebook post published today in her account.

“Everything has to do with geopolitics and international power. Sometimes this modus operandi has global effects, like banning the possibility of a peace agreement between the US and other powers with Iran over nuclear proliferation, and sometimes it prevents agreements that could contribute to finding the truth about the AMIA terrorist attack,” Ms Kirchner added.

Nisman, his defenders and the puticlubs

Haracio Verbitsky gives this sketch of the political positioning over the death of prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who was in charge of the investigation of the 1994 AMIA terrorist attack in Buenos Aires that claimed 85 lives (Señores y señoras Página/12 22.03.2015):

{Nelson} Castro alegó que Nisman fue víctima de un magnicidio institucional, la afirmación dogmática de la exposa del fiscal, la jueza Sandra Arroyo Salgado. En su caso, y en el de la madre del fiscal, Sara Garfunkel, es obvio el interés patrimonial, ya que ningún seguro de vida cubre el suicidio. En la misma línea, y por sus propias razones, el gobierno de Israel sostuvo en el acto por los 23 años del atentado a su {Buenos Aires} embajada {en 1992} que Nisman pagó con su vida el intento de llegar a la verdad. Por eso el fiscal fue sepultado en el sector del cementerio comunitario {judio} destinado a los héroes de Israel. Otro tanto pretenden las organizaciones de lobby estadounidenses, efectores de los servicios de Inteligencia o de la derecha republicana más extrema, que han tomado el Capitolio como teatro de operaciones, con el respaldo del filántropo emplumado Paul Singer.

Pero nada de eso surge de la causa que instruye la fiscal Viviana Fein, caratulada hasta hoy como muerte dudosa. No hay en ella elementos irrefutables para considerar que se suicidó, pero menos aún para decir que lo mataron. Si la investigación culminara con la primera hipótesis, ¿sus restos serían trasladados al confín del cementerio, reservado a quienes se quitaron la vida? Improbable, porque eso implicaría un respeto por la verdad que hasta ahora no se ha manifestado en ese grupo familiar y político.

[{Nelson} Castro alleged that Nisman was the victim of an institutional political assassination, the dogmatic assertion of the prosecutor's ex-wife, Judge Sandra Arroyo Salgado. In her case, and in that of the prosector's mother, Sara Garfunkel, the personal family interest is obvious, because no life insurance covers suicide. In the same line, and for its own reasons, the government of Israel maintained in the observation of the 23rd anniversary of the attack on its {Buenos Aires} embassy {in 1992} that Nisman paid with his life for attempting to find the truth. Because of that, the prosecutor was buried in the section of {Jewish} community cemetery designated for heroes of Israel. Another point claimed by the American lobby organizations, operatives of the intelligence services or of the most extreme right wing of the Republican {Party}, which has take the {Washington} Capitol as it theater of operations, with the backing of the feathered philanthropist Paul Singer. {The "feathered" part is a reference to his Singer's role as the most visible of the "vulture funds" leaders currently trying to drive Argentina into bankruptcy with the help of a Nixon zombie judge.}

But none of this emerges from the that the prosecutor Vivian Fein is hearing, caracterized until today as a dubious death. There are no irrefutable elements to consider it a suicide, but even less to say that he was murdered. If the investigation culminates in the first hypothesis, will his remains be relocated to the edge of the cemetery reserved for those who take their lives? Unlikely, because this would imply a respect for the truth that until now this family and political group has not demonstrated.]

Verbitsky is being a tad quaint, or maybe generous, by assuming that there is a "right wing" within the Republican Party, as opposed to its being a hardline rightwing Party generally.

Verbitsky is addressed the defensiveness of Nisman's conservative defenders like Nelson Castro, Sergio Bergman, Nelson Castro and Jacobo Kovadloff, who would prefer not to have the apparent womanizing of Nisman's in the "pickup clubs [puticlubs] of Palermo Hollywood." (Pickup clubs here is a euphemism for whorehouse.) Because, Verbitsky argues, his extracurricular activities with dubious lady friends could be relevant to the question of whether Nisman was being blackmailed in some way. Given the extreme frivolousness of the serious formal charge he made against President Cristina Fernández, evidence that he was playing politics with the AMIA investigation, and his supposed suicide itself, it's hard to say Verbitsky doesn't have a good point there. Verbitsky also includes the suggestion that Nisman could have been using public funds to finance some of his recreational activities in the puticlubs.

Verbitsky discusses some dubious travel claims on the public dime that Nisman made, apparently involving girlfriends of some sort. The article also features a photo of the late Nisman with three party girls. And he observes that without Nisman's death, "no se hubieran abierto sus archivos, con las constancias de su vulnerabilidad ante cualquier extorsión" ("his files would not have been opened with their evidence of his vulnerability to any kind of extorsion").

Verbitsky also takes note of the report a week ago in the rightwing Brazilian magazine Veja last week that was also picked up by the Jewish Telegraph Agency (JTA) news wire and the liberal Israeli Haaretz newspaper alleging a Venezuela-Argentine-Iranian plot based on cockamamie reasoning and evidence. Shredding the Veja story in several ways, Verbitsky also reports that Nilda Garré, a former Argentine Ambassador, who Veja named as a key figure in the alleged Iranian plot - and who Veja misidentified as having been a Montonero guerrilla back in the day - sent a letter to the magazine rejecting their account. Which was so ham-handed and based on such frivolous assumption is was pretty much a joke, anyway. Garré later served as Minister of Defense and Minister of Security under the Kirchner governments of Néstor and Cristina.

A new - and more than dubious - charge against Argentina over Venezuela and Iran

Haaretz is carrying a JTA (Jewish Telegraph Agency) story that makes me wonder if the US government isn't actively collaborating in some kind of "regime change" operating in Argentina, Iran's 'deal' with Argentine president: Campaign funding for quiet about bombing 03/15/2015.

Since Argentine President Cristina Fernández' constitutional term ends this year and she's leaving office, there's wouldn't seem to be any obvious urgency about ousting her from office.

But politics doesn't always operate rationally, to put it mildly. The experience of the kirchmerismo policy of CFK and her late husband and predecessor as President Néstor Kirchner has been a major challenge to the neoliberal "Washington Consensus" economic model, and a successful one. The vulture funds' fight over Argentina's debt, most visibly lead by hedge fund zillionaire Paul Singer, one of the largest individual contributors to the Republican Party, has give the well-heeled vulture funds interest group particular reason to attack and discredit Cristina, even this late in her final term.

In Argentina, the opposition is scattered and divided, currently looking an uphill fight against whatever candidate Cristina's Peronist Partido Justicialista and its electoral coalition the Frente para la Victoria (FpV) put up to succeed her. The two major media monopolies of the newspapers Clarín and La Nación are both furious at CFK for legislation she sponsored limiting their ability to expand their monopolies.

On top of all this, American and Israeli hawks wanting a war with Iran are very concerned to keep as a propaganda point the as-yet-unproven claim that Iran was behind the deadly 1994 bombing attack on the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires. The prosecutor investigating the AMIA case, Alberto Nisman, died in January of an apparently suicide after bringing a formal charge against CFK for allegedly trying to block the investigation of Iranian suspects in the AMIA bombing. The charge itself was obviously frivolous, and the Argentine courts quickly tossed it out. (I've blogged on this numerous times since January.)

But the opposition has seized on this case and run with it despite the frivolity of the Nisman's charge against her. Conservative members of the judiciary have taken an unusual, highly public role in solidarity with the political opposition using this issue as a pretext. CFK and her supporters have taken to calling this faction the Judicial Party. And at least some part of the Nisman gambit against her was encouraged and facilitated by anti-CFK members of the intelligence services (SI), which until the last few weeks has not faced a major reform and has been known to harbor people still sympathetic in some way to the military dictatorship of 1976-83. Antonio “Jaime” Stiuso, an SI holdover from the days of the dictatorship, has received particular attention in this regard in 2015.

Daniel CancelPablo Rosendo Gonzalez report for Bloomberg Business, Argentina Calls Ex-Spy to Testify: Challenge Is Now Finding Him 02/09/2015:

In his only known interview, conducted by phone with the weekly news magazine Noticias and published Dec. 16, Stiuso said he planned to retire when he reached 65. The same day the magazine was sent to newsstands, Fernandez removed the top officials at the intelligence agency, including Stiuso, though he wasn’t named publicly. The new head of intelligence, Oscar Parrilli said Feb. 5 that Stiuso retired on Jan. 5.

The Haaretz report from the JTA wire tells a tale involving three Venezuelans now evidently cooperating with the Obama Administration in their regime-change operation against Venezuela, which the Administration has official declared "unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States." They claim that Iran channeled funds for CFK's 2007 Presidential campaign through Venezuela in exchange for protecting Iranian officials from investigation and prosecution in the AMIA case.

Three problems leap out from the first paragraph of the story. The charge that Cristina was protecting Iranian suspects was central to Nisman's formal accusation thrown out by the Argentina courts, and there is no evidence for it. Nisman's specific charge was that CFK and her Foreign Minister had asked Interpol to remove their "red alerts" on several Iranian suspects. But the head of Interpol during that period said not only did they not push Interpol to drop the red alerts but, on the contrary, had continually pushed Interpol to locate them. Which is consistent with the very public position Cristina took in Argentina and before the United Nations.

The second problem is that the alleged Venezuelan connection with the non-existent effort by CFK to shield Iranian suspects was not part of Nisman's charge. This is the first time I've seen it broached.

Third, it ties in with a previous charge involving a fact, that a US-Venezuelan businessman, Guido Antonioni Wilson, was caught bringing 800 thousand US dollars into Argentina in August of 2007 undeclared. This case became a propaganda point against Venezuela, allegedly showing their interference in other Latin American countries. The incident came at a time that Argentina was in an important negotiations about energy imports from Venezuela. This is a 2007 New York Times report on the incident: Alexei Barrionuevo, Cash-Stuffed Suitcase Splits Venezuela and Argentina 08/14/2007.

Raúl Kollmann reported on the case in 2012 for Página/12, Antonini podría recuperar media valija 12.06.2012:

Los sucesivos jueces nunca dieron por acreditado que el principal funcionario que venía en ese avión, Claudio Uberti, supiera que Antonini traía ese dinero. Uberti era titular del Organo de Control de Concesiones Viales (Occovi), pero en verdad casi ejercía de embajador en el tema más acuciante de ese momento: las negociaciones por la importación de combustibles desde Venezuela. En el expediente no se encontraron pruebas sólidas de un vínculo entre Uberti y Antonini, y se convalidó que el venezolano fue subido al avión por pedido de Uzcátegui, funcionario de Pdvsa. Los jueces y fiscales argentinos que actuaron en el expediente pidieron la extradición de Antonini y también de Uzcátegui, pero ni Estados Unidos ni Venezuela accedieron. Es más: el gobierno norteamericano informó oficialmente el mes pasado que no extraditaría a Antonini. Venezuela nunca contestó.

En Estados Unidos, el caso derivó en un sonado juicio en el que allegados a Antonini fueron acusados de ser agentes del gobierno de Hugo Chávez. Fue un proceso que sirvió en esencia para hacer publicidad contra la administración venezolana y, curiosamente, se le aceptó a Antonini la excusa de que el dinero no era de él sino que eran fondos de Chávez para la campaña presidencial de 2007 de Cristina Kirchner. La hipótesis era todavía más asombrosa si se considera que Chávez llegó a la Argentina al día siguiente del vuelo en el que aterrizó Antonini, y si ése era el objetivo, habría traído los fondos en los dos aviones de su comitiva, que tenían protección diplomática y no serían revisados. Otro dato que evidencia que el dinero era de Antonini es que el empresario registraba giros anteriores de Montevideo a Miami por cifras millonarias, y lo cierto es que en aquella oportunidad estuvo 48 horas en Buenos Aires para luego irse a Uruguay.

{The successive judges [in charge of the case in Argentina] never said on the record that the principal [Argentine] functionary that traveled in this place, Caludio Uberti, knew that Antonini was carrying this money. Uberti was the head of the Organo de Control de Concesiones Viales (OCCOVI), but in reality was almost acting as the Ambassador [to Venezuela] in the most urgent theme of that moment: the negotiations for the importation of fuel from Venezuela. in the documentation, no solid proof was found of a connection between Uberti and Antonini, and it confirmed that the Venezuelan [Antonioni] was placed on the flight at the request of Uzcátegui, official of PDVSA [the Venezuelan state oil company]. The judges and prosecutors that handled the documentation requested the extradition of Antonini [from the United States] and also of Uzcátegui [from Venezuela]. In addition: the American government made an official notification last month [May 2012] that it would not extradict Antonini. Venezuela never responded.

In the United States, the case stemmed from a much-discussed case in which intimates of Antonini were said to be agents of the government of Hugo Chávez. It was a trial that served in essence to make publicity against the Venezuelan administration and, curiously, accepted Antonini's excuse that that money was not his but rather from fund of Chávez for the 2007 Presidential campaign of Cristina Kirchner. The hypothesis was even more astonishing when one considers that Chávez arrived in Argentina the following day after the flight in which Antonini landed, and if that were the objective, he [Chávez] could have brought the funds in the two place of his retinue which had diplomatic protection and would not have been searched. Another datum that indicates that the was was Antonini's is that the businessman registered previous flight from Montivideo to Miami with sums of million, and it is certain that in that opportunity in Buenos Aires for 48 hours to later go to Uruguay.}

This is a reminder that incidents like this, once they get incorporated into a propaganda narrative against an "unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States" can keep popping up for years, even decades, as an ostensible reason for taking controversial actions. In this instance, there is a possibly-true but unproven claim about a 1994 terrorist attack (AMIA) in Argentina newly married to a nearly eight-year-old chestnut about Venezuelan meddling in Argentine politics used as a propaganda club against Argentina's current President. From the Haaretz story:

The Brazilian magazine Veja on Saturday reported that the deal, brokered by Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, also provided the Iranians with nuclear know-how.

“I need you to broker with Argentina for aid to my country’s nuclear program. We need Argentinians to share their knowledge on nuclear technology; without this collaboration it is impossible to advance our program,’ Ahmadinejad told Chavez on Jan 13, 2007, according to the testimony of three former Chavez Cabinet members who now live in the United States and are collaborating in crime investigation.

“Don’t worry about the expenses required for this operation. Iran will support everything necessary to persuade the Argentines. I have another issue. I need you to discourage the Argentinians from insisting that Interpol capture the authorities of my country,” added the Iranian president, according to the report. Chavez agreed.

The Treasury Venezuela bought $6 billion in Argentina’s bonds to cover its debt in 2007 and 2008. The Argentine government also received cash for the agreement. One of three former Venezuelan officials said that the famous suitcase of Guido Antonioni Wilson, containing $ 800,000 which he brought into the country without claiming, came from the Iranian regime and was bound for the presidential campaign of Cristina Kirchner and that Chavez was just the middlemen.

This story is very shaky to put it mildly. The charge that Argentina was collaborating with Iran is one that I've not heard before and haven't researched. Politically, though, that seems to be an escalation of diplomatic hostility by the US against Argentina for this story to emerge in this fashion, however shaky its factual foundation is.

Argentine opposition keeps going after the President over prosecutor Nisman's death

Argentine President Cristina Fernández' opposition isn't giving up on trying to hang the apparent death-by-suicide of prosecutor Alberto Nisman around her neck. Along with the frivolous charge he made against her to portray her as a friend of Iranian terrorists.

TV Pública argentina reports on recent developments in Visión 7-Causa Nisman: Fein citó a peritos de la querella 06.03.2015:

One of the leading faces of this continuing push is Sandra Arroyo, a judge who is also the ex-wife of Nisman and the mother of his two children. The latest version of the accusation is that somehow the death scene was altered in order to conceal the fact that Islamic fundamentalists murdered him. (Horacio Verbitsky, El cupo femenino Página/12 08.03.2015)

I don't know why in reading Verbitsky's story I was thinking that it would be hard for Americans to believe that the opposition could be using such cockamamie claims against the President with the full backing of major opposition figures. I guess it was just an American Exceptionalism moment. Because it's commonly claimed in FOXWorld that our President is a Kenyan Muslim Marxist atheist who hates America and loves Islamic fundamentalist terrorists and helps them kill American diplomats in Benghazi while Hillary Clinton hides her e-mails to her lesbian lovers.

The more I learn about the history of Argentina since the Second World War, though, the more I take it for granted that the American government and major economic interests routinely meddle in Argentine politics. The fact that there are depressing similarities in the way rightwingers in both countries sling sleaze isn't that surprising.

A former security official, Antonio Horacio Stiuso, is one of the key players in this political drama. It's already provided enough plot material for a variety of novels, police procedural TV episodes and movies. But it doesn't need the Hollywood treatment to be dramatic and convoluted on its own. As the Buenos Aires Herald reports, "Nisman used to work hand-in-hand with former Intelligence Secretariat (SI, formerly known as SIDE) Operations chief Antonio 'Jaime' Stiuso." (Lagomarsino back in Nisman spotlight 03/07/2015)

And the connection to the 1994 terrorist attack on the AMIA Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires adds more complications. Gareth Porter recounts how Israel in the 1990s adopted Iran as a bogeyman that has served various functions in Israeli foreign policy. (The long history of Israel gaming the 'Iranian threat' Middle East Eye 03/05/2015):

Other Israeli prime ministers [besides Nethanyahu] have played the Holocaust card for domestic purposes too. Yitzhak Rabin actually started it during his tenure as Prime Minister from 1992 to 1995, pointing to the alleged “existential threat” from Iran in order to justify his policy of negotiating with the PLO. It was also Rabin who established the propaganda theme of Iran as a terrorist threat to Jews across five continents that Netanyahu continues to cite today.

Later, however, Netanyahu would use the alleged Iranian threat to do exactly the opposite – refuse to reach an agreement with the Palestinians. Many former senior military and intelligence officials have never forgiven Netanyahu for what they consider a reckless policy toward Iran that they link to his failure to deal with the Palestinian problem. [my emphasis]

The AMIA attack is used as a major example of Iran's ability to project terrorist attacks far away from home, not only by Israeli politicians but by American neocons. After two decades of important players in American and Israeli foreign policy relying on the AMIA attack as a key propaganda point against Iran, there are enough people with more of an interest in keeping that story accepted as fact than in determining the actual perpetrators to have muddled the waters on this case for two decades now.

I've posted several times on the AMIA case, including years before the Nisman suicide. The case has never been solved. The Argentine government's theory of the case on which Nisman operated in investigating the case for years, is that Iranian-backed terrorists were involved. Cristina's government reached an agreement in 2013 with Iran to facilitate investigation of some Iranians who are suspected of involvement in the AMIA bombing. Former President Carlos Menem and two other officials are under indictment in Argentina over obstruction of justice in the early investigation of the case. There are indications that the Argentine intelligence service was involved in the bombing in itself in some way. But that has also never been proved.

It is important to recognize, however, that the assumption that has been routinely used for two decades in American commentary on this topic that Iran was obviously behind the AMIA attack has never been proven in court and is by no means circumstantially clear form the information in the public record.

Cristina Fernández on the uses of the AMIA case

Argentin President Cristina Fernández has posted a statement in English on her website dealing with the international implications of the AMIA case, Dates, facts and strategies. Argentina and AMIA as collateral damages of the Middle East issue 03/05/3015.

This is the full text of the statement from her website (my emphasis in bold):

Yesterday, March 3, Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, called by the Republican Party, addressed the US Congress.

Netanyahu’s speech had just one target: prevent Obama’s agreement with Iran on the Nuclear Plan.

This time the US administration is not alone. It is accompanied by the other four permanent members of the Security Council of the UN: France, England, China, Russia, plus Germany.

The Israeli Premier mentioned, among other arguments: “Beyond the Middle East, Iran attacks US and its allies through its global terrorist network. They blew up the center of the Jewish community and the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires”. Sic.

Today, March 4, CIJ (Judicial Information Center), an agency of the Supreme Court, published 2 identical legal documents signed by deceased prosecutor Nisman dated December 2014 and January 2015.

The documents were at the AMIA Prosecutorial safebox and they hadn’t been submitted. They were delivered to judge Rafecas by the 6 senior secretaries of the prosecutor, who said they knew Nisman had signed that writs before leaving for holidays.

In those writs Nisman not only makes no allusion to the complaint filed on January 14, 2015 against the President of the Republic, her Chancellor, a National Deputy and others. But also presents a diametrically opposite position. He performs highly positive considerations about government policy on AMIA from 2004 to present. He highlihts [sic] Néstor and Cristina Kirchner speeches at UN. He asks President Kirchner to request the immediate intervention of the Security Council of the UN so that body “activates the compulsive mechanisms conferred by Chapter VII of the UN Charter and enjoin the Islamic Republic of Iran to arrest with extradition purposes” indicted Iranians with Interpol Red Notices.

On February 27, Clarín publishes under the title “Rafecas’ decision surprises in Washington” some clarifying statements by Joseph Humire. Director of the Center for a Secure Free Society, based in Washington, coauthor of “The strategic penetration of Iran in Latin America” and defined by Tiempo Argentino (March 2, page 5) as a “security expert of the Republican right”. Humire, according to Clarín, “knows in detail the AMIA case”. He also knows Nisman’s complaint and the prosecutor himself, as they both were called to the US Congress in June 2013 to speak about the influence of the Iranian regime in the region.

The important thing is what Humire says… “I don’t believe that Nisman wanted to attack the President. It was not his purpose. I think somehow he was using Cristina Kirchner as a link to open AMIA case to a global level, international courts, UN.” Sic, believe it or not.

But there is still more. According to Humire, Nisman “wanted the Iranians to present themselves to Justice, as Interpol alerts do not work”. Worse and worse, especially if we remember that the main argument of Nisman’s complaint against the Government was that we wanted the Red Notices down.

On May 1, during my “State of the Union” address, I said AMIA case had become a chessboard of national and international geopolitics. The same thing I said in 2003 to the Federal Court that judged the AMIA case and which judgement demolished judge Galeano’s “made up investigation”. 15 years later, AMIA 2, another process because of the concealment, is still waiting.

Dates, facts and strategies that have nothing to do with the justice that the 85 victims of AMIA, their families and our country deserve.

For some, Argentina and AMIA are just collateral damages in a war we never took part nor want to.

The claim is the same as 21 years ago: Memory, Truth and Justice. At some point, they should arrive, like they did for the victims of State terrorism.

Speaking of dates, facts and strategies: On March 17 there are elections in Israel. Two weeks after Netanyahu decided to go talk to the US Congress. It will also be 23 years from the attack to Israel Embassy in Buenos Aires. Yet, here is not even one convicted or arrested. As in AMIA case.

Cristina

The Spanish version is at De fechas, hechos y estrategias. Argentina y AMIA como daños colaterales de la cuestión de Medio Oriente. 04.03.2015

Argentine President Cristina Fernández moves on with business despite the "Judicial Party"

Argentine President Cristina Fernández (CFK) just gave her final opening address of this Presidential term for the new term of the Argentine Congress. The Buenos Aires Herald reports ('Don't use AMIA for political point-scoring' 03/01/2015):

In an explosive last address to Congress, President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner harshly questioned the political use of the AMIA bombing, blasted the “Judicial Party” for “parting away from the Constitution”, and assured she will not leave a country that submissively allows the new administration to modify the achievements she reviewed during her speech.

One of the new policy measures she announced was a proposal to re-nationalize the railroads, continuing her program of reversal and reconstruction from the decades of neoliberal policies that proceeded the crisis of 2001. (Stella Calloni, Cristina Fernández anuncia la nacionalización de los ferrocarriles La Journada 01.03.2015)

Cristina's "Judicial Party" construction is a good label for the public demonstrations of sitting judges that were clearly fronts for opposition efforts to unseat her even before the end of his Presidential term later this year.

(It strikes me that we have our own US version of the Judicial Party. See Bush v. Gore. And Citizens United.)

TV Pública argentina provides this extended video (3hrs. 46 mins.) of the opening session events, Visión 7 - Apertura de sesiones ordinarias: discurso de la Presidenta 01.03.2015

CFK: "El Partido Judicial se ha independizado de la Constitución" Página/12 01.03.2015:

CFK also addressed the legal charge that the late prosecutor Alberto Nisman brought against her, which were just resoundingly rejected by a judge as being too frivolous to pursue. INFOnews reports (“¿A qué Nisman le creo: al que presentó la denuncia o al que me felicitaba?” (""Which Nisman do I believe: the one who presented the charges or the one that congratulated me?") 01.03.2015).

One of the secretaries from Nisman's AMIA prosecutor's unit, Soledad Castro, has provided two documents signed by Nisman that contradicted the charge Nisman made against CFK that she was trying to cover up for Iranian suspects in the 1994 AMIA bombing. "El caso debería llamarse Nisman vs. Nisman" ("The case should have been called Nisman vs. Nisman"), Cristina said in her speech.

The Nisman/AMIA case: Justice and Intelligence

Sonia Budassi y Andrés Fidanza have an investigative article looking the close and dubious relationship between the Argentine justice system and the intelligence services in connection with the death of Alberto Nisman, the prosecutor who had been in charge of the investigation of the 1994 AMIA terrorist attack: El rompecabezas Nisman Anfibia (accessed 02/21/2015).

Fidanza talks about the article in this interview, Visión 7 - Luces y sombras en la causa Nisman TV Pública argentina 20.02.2015:

They write:

Cuando lo policial y lo político se mezclan, los casos se convierten en una cuestión de fe: la realidad llega al extremo de lo subjetivo; en el barro mediático, quizá triunfe la operación mejor orquestada. Es la batalla por el verosímil. En el caso Nisman, la trama jurídica se enreda con traiciones íntimas y lealtades corporativas. El rompecabezas de la muerte del fiscal reúne al terrorismo internacional y a la omnipresencia de la CIA, al gobierno, a la oposición culpando del crimen a la presidenta Cristina Fernández de Kirchner; a las lecturas sobre el trabajo de Nisman, su obsesión y su vanidad personal. Los conflictos históricos se vuelven estridentes: la autonomía de algunos sectores de la Secretaría de Inteligencia (SI); las relaciones entre la justicia y los servicios. Mientras la evidencia lo permita, se exaltará o disimulará la importancia de cada pieza. Más allá de que la fiscal Viviana Fein descubra qué pasó el domingo 18 de enero dentro del baño del departamento de Le Parc, la “zona opaca” transitada por juristas e Inteligencia está quedando expuesta.

[When police business and politics mix together, cases convert themselves into a question of faith: reality arrives at the extreme of the subjective; in the media mud, the better orchestrated operation may triumph. It is the battle for the plausible. In the Nisman case, the judicial trauma become entangled with intimate betrayals and collective loyalties. The jigsaw puzzle of Nisman's death reunites international terrorism and the CIA's omnipresence, the government, and the opposition from President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of the crime; the interpretations of the work of Nisman, his obsession and his personal vanity. Historical conflicts return stridently: the autonomy of some sectors of the Secretary of Intelligence (SI); the relations between the justice {authorities} and the {intelligence} services. When the evidence permits, the importance of every piece is amplified or concealed. Beyond what prosecutor Viviana Fein discovered what happened on Sunday, January 18, inside the bathroom of the apartment of Le Parc {where Nisman's presumed suicide occurred}, the "opaque zone" transited by justice officials and Intelligence remains on display.

Nisman's witch-hunt against Cristina Fernández goes forward

An Argentine prosecutor is proceeding with the ludicrous charges against President Cristina Fernández brought originally against her by the late prosecutor Alberto Nisman: Prosecutor to question Argentine president in alleged bomb plot cover-up Aljazeera America 02/13/2015

Elias Groll also reports on this story in Prosecutor Forwards Case Against Kirchner in Probe of Bombing Cover-Up Foreign Policy 02/13/2015:

The Argentine government reacted angrily to the development Friday. It denied that leaders colluded with Iran to sabotage an investigation into who carried out an attack that left 85 people dead, and ranks as the worst act of terrorism in Argentina’s history.

“This is an active judicial coup,” said cabinet chief Jorge Capitanich, according to the Guardian. “There is no proof at all. The people have to know that this is a vulgar lie, an enormous press operation.”

Presidential spokesman Anibal Fernández called Friday’s developments a “clear maneuver to destabilize democracy.”

Those descriptions are correct. In this article, they appear as the last three paragraphs. "This side says, the other side says" just doesn't do it for a story like this.

Economics Minister Axel Kicillof, who is kind of the Yanis Varoufakis of Argentina, publicly rejected one of the key claims in Nisman's charge (Kicillof blasts Nisman’s ‘economic’ complaint Buenos Aires Herald 02/16/2015):

One of Nisman’s key accusations against the Fernández de Kirchner administration was that the president and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman had agreed to lift Interpol’s arrest warrants against the Iranian officials accused of organizing the AMIA bombing in exchange for access to Iranian oil — which in turn would be traded for locally produced grains.

“The complaint suggests that all the alleged diplomatic manoeuvres the government adopted were made so they could exchange something that we don’t have — grains, since they aren’t owned by the state — for something we don’t need — crude oil,” Kicillof said. “It’s ridiculous.”

The Economy minister stressed that for this reason the complaint by the late prosecutor, filed some days before he was found dead in his Puerto Madero apartment building, was “economic nonsense.”

“It isn’t possible for Argentina to purchase oil from Iran because its crude oil has a high sulphur content, a type of oil which can’t be refined by the country’s oil refineries,” Kicillof said.

As for the grain argument, he said suggesting such a move by the national government was ridiculous because grains are owned by exporters and farm owners.

“The case doesn’t appear to have any merit, in anything that’s said,” Kicillof stressed, pointing out that after the 2013 signing of the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran, commercial relations with the Asian country deteriorated — so if that was the objective, it was a complete failure.

Argentina and US participants in its politics

The more I learn about Argentina, the less surprised I am at seeing indications that Americans in both official and private roles play major roles in Argentine internal politics.

Also, I'm learning more about who to take seriously writing about Argentina and who not.

Uki Goñi is the author of the strangest of A strange trio of articles from Germany's "Jungle World" on Argentina that I wrote about a few days ago.

As I wrote there, his article included the claim, presented as though it were straight fact, "Argentina is today a one-party state, like Mexico in the times of PRI rule. Since eight years ago there has been only Peronist governments, governors, mayors."

As I discussed there, this is a plainly false and ridiculous claim that any high school student with a web browser and a bit of patience could quickly determine was not true.

But Uki Goñi is good enough for the New York Times, which just ran a piece of his, How Argentina ‘Suicides’ the Truth 02/10/2015. He makes this claim about the charges the late prosecutor Alberto Nisman made against President Cristina Fernández (CFK): "The countless hours of phone intercepts on which they were based revealed a conspiratorial underworld unlike anything a prosecutor had dared reveal before."

This is plainly ridiculous. Period. (See Gareth Porter for a cogent description in English.)

The New York Times also recently ran a good article on the AMIA/Nisman case earlier by Argentine journalist and human rights activist Horacio Verbitsky. Not they run a piece of opposition propaganda fluff - ugly fluff - from this Goñi guy.

Another passage in Goñi's Times article gives an idea of his perspective. (I discount his actual reporting by a factor of at least 99%.) He writes, "Santiago Kovadloff, a 72-year-old philosopher who, in the aftermath of Mr. Nisman’s death, has emerged as the country’s moral compass..."

Now, I don't recall having heard of Kovadloff before. But maybe that's just me. Actually, he seems to be more of a literary type than a philosopher, but words seem to have flexible meanings for Sr. Goñi. But his biography at his blog, which apparently doesn't include actual blog posts, says he got a philosophy degree at the University of Buenos Aires, so I guess that counts. He writes opinion pieces for La Nación, a hardline conservative paper that is the traditional mouthpiece of the Argentine oligarchy.

Maybe Uki Goñi gets some of his bad ideas direct from Kovadloff, who wrote this sneering and FOX-News-level partisan comment in 2013 of kirchnerismo, the brand of Left Peronism identified with CFK and her late husband and predecessor as President, Néstor Kirchner:

El kirchnerismo es, desde su origen, un ejercicio inflexible y despiadado del poder. Hacer de la República una gran Santa Cruz significa convertir a la Nación en un escenario definitivamente vertebrado por un poder supremo no sujeto a ningún control, que es lo mismo que decir adueñado para siempre de la ley.

[Kirchnerismo is, from its origin, an inflexible and implacable exercise of power. To make the Republic into a big Santa Cruz {the province where Néstor was Governor} would mean to convert the nation into a stage definitively structured by a supreme power not subject to any control, which is to say, seizing control forever of the law.]

That statement is as ridiculous as those that have defined Goñi's work for me.

Santiago Kovadloff appears to be a philosopher of the Sean Hannity school of political theory.

Meanwhile, in the real world, the investigation into the apparent suicide of Alberto Nisman goes on. (La jueza ordenó cotejar un ADN hallado en el departamento de Nisman Página/12 11.02.2015)

Visión 7 - Causa Nisman: La jueza ordenó analizar otro perfil genético TV Pública argentina 10.02.2015:

Gareth Porter on the Nisman suicide and the AMIA case in Argentina

Historian Gareth Porter writes about the AMIA and Alberto Nisman cases in Argentina in The Nisman murder and the AMIA terror bombing: A tangled thread; the article appears also at Consortium News under the title A Rush to Judgment in Argentine Bomb Case? 02/07/2015.

TV Pública argentina recently presented this report on recent developments in Visión 7 - Nuevas declaraciones en la causa Nisman 02/06/2015:

Porter raises the very obvious question about the opposition's conspiracy theory, one with no evidence at all, that President Cristina Fernández (CFK) somehow had him murdered:

In the context of Argentine political culture, with its long experience of impunity for crimes committed by the powerful, the circumstances of his death have led to a general conviction that the government must have been behind his murder.

But there is good reason to be cautious about that assumption. Nisman’s case against Kirchner was problematic. The central accusation in his affidavit, made 96 times, according to press accounts, was that Kirchner and Timerman had sought to revoke the Interpol arrest warrants against the former Iranian officials. But Ronald K. Noble, the secretary general of Interpol for fifteen years until last November, denied Nisman’s accusation. Noble declared, “I can say with 100 percent certainty, not a scintilla of doubt, that Foreign Minister Timerman and the Argentine government have been steadfast, persistent and unwavering that the Interpol’s red notices be issued, remain in effect and not be suspend or removed.”

Noble’s denial raises an obvious question: Why would the Kirchner government, knowing that Nisman’s main claim could be easily refuted, have any reason to kill him on the eve of the presentation of his case? Why give those seeking to discredit the government’s policy on the AMIA bombing the opportunity to shift the issue from the facts of the case to the presumption of officially sponsored assassination?

Porter suggests that Nisman's official charges against the current Iranian suspects in the 1994 AMIA bombing was similarly flawed as the charges against Cristina and her Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman:

The presentation of facts or allegations as proof of guilt, even though they proved nothing of the sort, was also a pattern that permeated Nisman’s 2006 “Request for Arrests” in the 1994 AMIA bombing. Contrary to the general reverence in the news media for his indictment of senior Iranian officials for their alleged responsibility for the bombing, his case was built on a massive accumulation of highly dubious and misleading claims, from the “irrefutable evidence” of Rabbani’s participation in planning to the identification of the alleged suicide car bomber. This writer’s investigation of the case over several months, which included interviews with US diplomats who had served in the Embassy in Buenos Aires in the years following the AMIA bombing as well as with the FBI official detailed to work on the case in 1996-97, concluded that the Argentine investigators never found any evidence of Iranian involvement.

Nisman asserted that the highest Iranian officials had decided to carry out the bombing at a meeting on 12 or 14 August, 1993, primarily on the testimony of four officials of the Mujahedeen E-Khalq (MEK), the Iranian exile terrorist group that was openly dedicated to the overthrow of the Iranian regime. The four MEK officials claimed to know the precise place, date and time and the three-point agenda of the meeting.

Everything I've seen about the charge against CFK Nisman made is ridiculous. But Porter's assertion about Nisman's AMIA arrest request for the AMIA bombing suspects seems to go against one of the argument's Cristina's defenders are making, which is that the sloppy nature of the report making charges against CFK suggests that Nisman himself didn't actually prepare the document.

Porter concludes, "The fact that Nisman’s two indictments related to Iran and AMIA were extremely tendentious obviously does not dispose of the question of who killed him. But whatever the reason for his being killed, it wasn’t because he had revealed irrefutable truths about AMIA and Argentine government policy."

Argentine Ambassador sends Members of Congress a letter on AMIA and Nisman

The Argentine Embassy in Washington has sent all Members of the US Congress a letter on the current controversy over AMIA and the death of prosecutor Alberto Nisman. (“Hay una búsqueda constante de justicia” Página/12 06.02.2015)

From Ambassador Cecilia Nahon's letter dated January 28, 2015:

The fight against impunity and international terrorism has been a fundamental pillar of the Governments of Presidents Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007) and Cristina Fernandez [sic] de Kirchner (2007 -present). Their Governments have actively promoted a firm state policy for the protection and defense of human rights nationally, regionally and internationally. Since 2003, Argentina has implemented the most comprehensive set of actions ever seen to bring truth and justice to the victims of the AMIA terrorist attack and to their families, and to punish all perpetrators and masterminds behind this terrible attack. These actions include the establishment in 2004 by the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic of Argentina of a Special Investigation Unit headed by Nisman, which ultimately charged Iranian officials.

Hence, the Government of Argentina is compelled to dismiss as baseless the recent allegations brought by the Special Investigation Unit for the AMIA case against it. None of the elements in those allegations constitute evidence whatsoever of any involvement of the Government of Argentina to cover up any responsibility in the atrocious AMIA attack. Therefore, the Government of Argentina emphatically rejects each and every one of these allegations.

The commitment of the Government of Argentina to INTERPOL's issuance and maintenance of the red notices published with reference to the crimes being investigated in the AMIA case is unquestionable. Indeed, in his letter to Foreign Minister Timerman dated January 16, 2015, Ronald Noble, Secretary General of INTERPOL between 2000-2014 mentioned that "... on each occasion that you and I spoke with and saw one another in relation to the INTERPOL Red Notices issued in connection to the AMIA case, you stated that INTERPOL should keep the Red Notices in force. Your position and that of the Argentinean government was consistent and unwavering ...."

After the AMIA investigation had been at standstill for six years since Iran would not agree to extradite the accused, and mindful that under Argentine law a person cannot be judged in absentia, Argentina signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Iran in 2013 with the ultimate objective to allow the Argentine judge to interrogate the accused in Tehran. The goal of this judicial cooperation agreement, which was approved by the Argentine Congress, was to move forward with our tireless and unwavering fight against international terrorism by bringing to justice-with the tools provided by the Argentine judicial system - all perpetrators and masterminds involved in the AMIA attack, as well as those who participated or covered it up. Nothing in this MOU has blocked the continuation of the investigation into the AMIA case. In fact, Amnesty International stated in February 2013 that "... the agreement between Argentina and Iran is an opportunity to reactivate the 1994 bombing legal case ... by enabling the pending questioning to proceed ...."

Furthermore, it is worth recalling Argentina's request to the United States Government on September 26, 2013, to include the issue of the AMIA terrorist attack in the renewed process of dialogue between the United States and Iran. [italics in original; my emphasis in bold]

The opposition to Cristina's government and policies have been going all out to make her look like an enabler after the fact of Iranian terrorism over the AMIA case.

Based on what I know of the AMIA and Nisman cases, this is a reasonable and accurate statement of the actions and positions of the Argentine government. It's also a carefully crafted diplomatic document, of course.

A strange trio of articles from Germany's "Jungle World" on Argentina

The German news site Jungle World has run some articles in the past that I thought were good. But they just ran a set of them on Argentina that are serious hackwork.

Marcus Munzlinger, Viva la Contrainformación! 29.01.2015, the lead article on page with the Argentina theme (shown on the front webpage as of 02/01/2015), "Buenos Aires im Nebel.Die Staatsaffäre nach dem Tod des Ermittlers Nisman," would lead the reader to believe that Argentina was a sinkhole of anti-Semitic violence. The opening paragraph introduces Hispan TV, a subsidiary of IRIB, Iran's state public TV company.

Since the set of articles is described on the front page under the rubric, "Buenos Aires im Nebel.Die Staatsaffäre nach dem Tod des Ermittlers Nisman" (Buenos Aires in Fog: the state affair after the death of the prosecutor Nisman") as of 02/01/2015, this is a distinctive introduction to the Nisman case, which is a part of the larger, much longer story of the AMIA terrorist attack in Buenos Aires in 1994.

The theory that Iran was behind the AMIA Jewish Community Center bombing is a major theme involved. That was the late prosecutor Alberto Nisman's theory of the case and the one on which the Argentine government has been operating. But that case has never been proven in court or convincingly established in the public record. And it has become highly politicized because both the US and Israel have been using it for over 20 years now as a key propaganda point against Iran.

So leading a series like this with an article that makes it sounds like Argentina is home to rampant, violent anti-Semitism directly encouraged by the Iranian government sets the stage in a particular way. One that the most hawkish neoconservative encouraging war with Iran would be happy to see. Jungle World calls itself, "Die linke Wochenzeitung" ("the weekly left newspaper").

The second piece in the series, Staat im Staat (29.01.2015) by Christian Rollmann, is on the whole a decent report on Nisman's death and its implications, including the problematic role of rogue elements in the security services, not least of them the only recently removed Jaime Stiuso.

The title "Argentenien ist heute ein Einparteienstaat" ("'Argentina is today a one-part state'") (29.01.2015) is a catchy title, since it makes Argentina sound like Communist East Germany, or maybe North Korea. It's an interview with "Argentine journalist and historian" Uki Goñi, who writes for The Guardian. The only sentence I'll both quoting from his interview are these two (my emphasis): "Argentinien ist heute ein Einparteienstaat, wie Mexiko zu Zeiten der PRI-Herrschaft. Bis auf acht Jahre gab es nur peronistische Regierungen, Gouverneure, Bürgermeister." ("Argentina is today a one-party state, like Mexico in the times of PRI rule. Since eight years ago there has been only Peronist governments, governors, mayors.")

Since anyone with even a general familiarity of Argentine politics would be gobsmacked by this painfully false claim. For my own geeky entertainment, I looked up the governors of the 23 Argentine provinces and the "autonomous city" of Buenos Aires. The Peronist Partido Justicialista (PJ) has held the national Presidency since 2003, when Néstor Kirchner was elected. The main opposition parties are the Unión Civica Radical (UCR) and the Partido Socialista (PS) Here are the current provincial governors and their party allifiations, most of which are in fact associated with the PJ:

Buenos Aires City: Mauricio Macri (PRO, a party closely aligned with the UCR on policy)
Buenos Aires Province: Daniel Scioli (PJ)
Catamarca: Lucía Corpacc (PJ)
Chaco: Juan Carlos Bacileff Ivanoff (PJ)
Chubut: Martín Buzzi (PJ)
Córdoba: José Manuel de la Sota (PJ)
Corrientes: Arturo Alejandro Colombi (UCR)
Entre Ríos: Sergio Daniel Urribarri (PJ)
Formosa: Gildo Insfrán (PJ)
Jujuy: Eduardo Alfredo Fellner (PJ)
La Pampa: Oscar Mario Jorge (PJ)
La Rioja: Luis Beder Herrera (PJ)
Mendoza: Francisco Pérez (PJ)
Misiones: Maurice Fabián Closs (PJ)
Neuquén: Jorge Augusto Sapag (MPN; Movimiento Popular Neuquino, a "Neoperonist" PJ offshoot)
Río Negro: Alberto Weretilneck (Frente Renovador, a neoliberal PJ spin-off headed by Sergio Massa)
Salta: Juan Manuel Urtubey (PJ)
San Juan: José Luis Gioja (PJ)
San Luis: Claudio Javier Poggi (PJ)
Santa Cruz: Daniel Román Peralta (PJ)
Santa Fe: Antonio Bonfatti (PS); Hermes Juan Binner (PS), the national leader of the Partida Socialista served as Governor 2007-2011
Santiago del Estero: Claudia Alejandra Ledesma Abdala de Zamora (Frente Cívico por Santiago, currently aligned with Cristina's national government)
Tierra del Fuego (properly Tierra del Fuego, Antártida e Islas del Atlántico Sur: María Fabiana Ríos (PS)
Tucumán: José Jorge Alperovich (PJ)

Of those 24, Buenos Aires City, Corrientes, Neuquén, Río Negro, Santa Fe, Santiago del Estero and Tierra del Fuego all have govenors not associated with Cristina's PJ, the Peronist party. We could be generous and assume that when Goñi says that the country has had only "Peronist governments, governors, mayors" for the last eight years, he was using Peronism as a very broad term. But even then, the claim is clearly false. Leaving aside that there have been a wide range of ideological trends that in some way were "Peronist," Macri's PRO, the UCR and the PS clearly are not among them.

It also very much the case that Argentina is a multi-party state with competitive, free elections. Major figures in distinct opposition to the national government and the PJ like Mauricio Macri and Sergio Massa have high profiles nationally. And the major press corporations associated with Clarín and La Nación are blatantly aligned with the opposition and daily produce critical coverage of the national government, not infrequently of an irresponsible nature.

Admittedly, the opposition is in crisis itself. But not because the government is repressing them. Macri and another major opposition leader, Elisa Carrió, just made an agreement that puts into question the future viability of the UCR as a party. (Sebastian Abrevaya, Cómo ganar la tapa con un romance de verano Página/12 01.02.2015; Macri and Carrió finally make it official Buenos Aires Herald 02.01.2015)

Argentina is not a "one-party state" in any remotely accurate meaning of the phrase.

So one really has to wonder what kind of columnist makes such a claim and what kind of editorship at Jungle World passes on such a demonstrably false claim, making no note of the factual falsity of it within the article.

Definitely a strange trio of articles. The middle one is a decent summary of the Nisman story. The first and third promote typical neocon "regime change" propaganda claims. And this is a German "left" publication. Weird.

The AMIA/Nisman case and controversies

The New York Times last week ran an English-language piece by Argentine journalist Horacio Verbitsky Reining In Argentina’s Spymasters 01/28/2015, discussing the current high-level political drama in Argentina over the AMIA terrorist case investigation and the suicide of prosecutor Alberto Nisman. Verbitsky is also the head of the human-rights Center for Legal and Social Studies (CELS). The Spanish version appears in Rienda corta para los espías argentinos Página/12 29.01.2015.

He writes:

The key to the story is not likely to be found in the present government, but rather in former president Carlos Menem’s administration. Mr. Menem is of Syrian descent, and before Argentina’s 1989 presidential election, he met in Damascus with the Syrian leader, Hafez al-Assad, who had backed him financially. Argentina’s participation in Operation Desert Storm against Syria’s ally, Iraq, in 1991, spoiled this romance. Then, in 1992, the Israeli embassy in Argentina was attacked and in 1994 the Jewish community center was bombed.

Secret documents that were declassified in 2003 revealed that Israel’s prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, sent a personal envoy to Argentina just hours after the 1994 attack to agree on a common interpretation of events to present to the press. At the time, Mr. Rabin was facing political pressure at home from opponents of the Oslo peace talks with the Palestinians, which were for the first time occurring with Syrian approval.

After his meeting with Mr. Menem, Mr. Rabin’s envoy accused Iran of the attack. The same week, a spokesman from the State Department in Washington went further and excluded Syria from the list of suspects.

Mr. Menem also found it politically convenient to look away from Syria, and he did all he could to prevent the Syrian angle from being investigated, due to his previous relationship with the Assad government and his unfulfilled promises to Syria of diplomatic support and cooperation on nuclear and missile technology.

Today, Mr. Menem is on trial alongside some of his cabinet members from that era, as well as a judge and two prosecutors accused of obstructing justice and covering up evidence about the 1994 attack.

Whether or not Iranian agents were involved in the 1994 AMIA attack, it' abundantly clear that the security services and Menem officials tried to obstruct the investigation for whatever reason.

So far, Nisman's death looks like a suicide. That doesn't exclude deliberate external pressure that drove him to it, intentionally or unintentionally. But the murder that President Cristina Fernández and her government have suggested has not been established. Verbitsky cautions them: "Mrs. Kirchner has flip-flopped between assuming it was a suicide and, later, suggesting it was not. It is an election year and although she cannot run for another term, her vacillating has not helped her party."

Here is a recent program from TV Pública argentina 678 - Los interrogantes del Caso Nisman - 29-01-15 (1 de 3):

678 - Los interrogantes del Caso Nisman - 29-01-15 (2 de 3):

678 - Los interrogantes del Caso Nisman - 29-01-15 (3 de 3):

Verbitsky does a close reading of Nisman's already-discredited report accusing Cristina and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman in Nismanismos Página/12 01.02.2015, focusing on passage that provide "ayuda a comprender la situación general de la que el fiscal fue voluntario o involuntario protagonista." ("support to comprehend the general situation of which the prosecutor was voluntarily or involuntarily the protagonist").

He focuses first on pp. 280-282 of Nisman's report, which the Argentine Centro de Información Judicial (CIJ) has made available here, the section headed, "VIII.- Breves consideraciones normativas." This section claims that part of the alleged "criminal plot" involved provisions in the Argentina-Iran agreement of 2013 on the investigation of the AMIA case. The larger accusation of the opposition, which Nisman's charges were intended to support is that the deal with Iran was a bad idea and motivated by more-or-less venal considerations. In the real world, the agreement was a effort to follow up on prosecutor Nisman's theory of the AMIA case, which is that it the bombing was planned and executed on orders from Iran.

But Section VIII also contains a reference to the agreement placing restrictions on the use of information from "terceros estados" ("third states," i.e., third countries) in the judicial investigation. Verbitsky plausibly suggests that this provides an indication "que lo que Nisman intenta preservar es la confidencialidad de las informaciones recibidas de los servicios de Inteligencia de Estados Unidos e Israel" ("that what Nisman intended to preserve is the confidentiality of pieces of information received from the intelligence services of the United States and Israel").

Israel and three successive US Administrations have found it useful to blame Iran for the AMIA attack. And that may be true. But, given the misconduct of Argentine officials and the intelligence services on the investigation of the case, it is always possible that actually solving the case would diminish the plausibility of blaming Iran. Whether or not Iran was behind it, both Washington and Tel Aviv have shown that they like that narrative and don't want to risk seeing it diluted. Verbitsky cites Wikileaks revelations and the work of Santiago O’Donnell, which establish that Nisman was working closely with the US Embassy, which was providing information bolstering the Iranian case and pressuring Nisman - unsuccessfully - to not bring charges against former President Carlos Menem and other officials of his government over obstruction of justice in the AMIA case, charges on which a trial is still pending.

Secondly, Verbitsky focuses on passages in Nisman's formal complaint from pages 5, 7, 97-98, 150, 154, 156, 160, 184, 185 and 206 in which Nisman appears to be defending himself against criticism, "cosa que no es en absolute usual" ("something that is absolutely not usual") in such a complaint. In other words, Nisman was presenting criticism against his handling of the case by officials of Cristina's Administration as supporting the accusation that she and Timerman were trying to protect Iranian persons of interest in the case. Verbitsky suggests that Nisman included those aspects because he failed to produce anything resembling plausible "smoking gun" against CFK (Cristina Fernández) or Timerman.

Something to keep in mind in discussions of Nisman's complaint. There may be some reason to doubt his authorship of the complaint that he signed and filed in his name. Part of the reason to doubt that was based on his supposedly having cut short a Spanish vacation with his daughter to return to Buenos Aires to file his report. But the prosecutor investigating Nisman's death says that he purchased the return ticket in December, which seems to remove the idea that he hastily returned to Argentina. I cite the report as Nisman's report and cite it as though it were his work, because in the most formal and official sense, it is.

Verbitsky also discusses Ronald Kenneth Noble, the American who headed Interpol as Secretary General from 2000–2014, which covers the period in which the key accusation against CFK and Timerman would have occurred, their alleged attempts to have Interpol remove the red alert status on several Iranian persons of interest in the AMIA case. Verbitsky quotes Noble on that accusation in the Times article: "In an interview on Jan. 18, Mr. Noble declared: 'Nisman’s claims are false.' The same day, Mr. Nisman was found dead." One likely factor in Nisman's suicide was that he surely must have realized he would be professionally discredited and possibly face charges on abuse of office himself because his case against CFK and Timerman was disintegrating so fast, a process in which Noble's denial was a major factor.

Verbitsky relates that early in 2006, Noble and Interpol were hesitant to establish the red alerts on those Iranians, because they regardede the evidence that Nisman had presented Interpol as insufficient justification. Both the Argentine government of Néstor Kirchner (CFK's late husband and predecessor as President) and the Cheney-Bush Administration pressed Interpol to issue the red alerts, which they did. He cites a cable from the American Ambassador to Argentina of that time, Earl Anthony Wayne, claiming that Noble was aligning himself with Iran on the matter. Though Verbitsky is not crediting Wayne's specific evaluation, he cites all this as a background to Nisman's charge on the red alerts, which establishes that Argentina's position had always been to press Interpol to establish and keep the alerts in force. And also that if CFK's government had pressured Interpol to drop them as Nisman alleged, Noble would have presumably been receptive to the request. But there is no evidence in the public record that I've seen to support that charge - including Nisman's report itself. The background only reinforces the implausibility of the unsubstantiated accusation. (The whole section on Noble doesn't cite specific references in Noble's response and is more supplementary commentary than a close reading of the report.)

In a further close reading of the report, Verbitsky cites charges from pages 59, 61 and 205 that try to present the signing of the agreement with Iran and its approval by the Argentine Congress as a cover for the alleged criminal plan of CFK and Timerman. This is a difficult needle that Nisman's report fails to thread. Making an agreement with Iran to facilitate the AMIA investigation was a perfectly Constitutional and legal act, even if it was arguably a poor agreement. (Which I don't think it was, BTW.) For that matter, it would have been a legitimate and legal act of state if the Argentine government had requested the red alerts to be dropped. But that is entirely hypothetical at this point unless actual evidence emerges that (1) CFK and Timerman actually requested that, and (2) that it was done with the intent of obstructing justice in the case. Poor judgment in foreign affairs isn't a criminal offense in Argentina or in any other country of which I'm aware. If that were the case, most heads of government and foreign ministers would routinely wind up in prison.

His final set of close reading analysis cites pages 102, 135, 141, 200, 230, 246, 250, 251, 253, 265 in which Nisman does try to establish CFK's criminal intent in the matter. Again, to say there is no smoking gun in that series of claims puts it mildly. It would take a tremendous imagination to take it into even circumstantial evidence, considering that the central claim against CFK and Timerman that they tried to have Interpol remove those red alerts is not only not established in any way but is contradicted by the evidence that is in the public record.

If you were a defense lawyer, you would want to have a client facing claims like those in Nisman's report.