The vice president of Argentina, Cristina Kirchner, presented this Tuesday (29) the last part of her defense to Justice in the process in which she is accused of leading a scheme to embezzle public funds during the period in which she and her husband, Néstor Kirchner (2003-2015), were presidents of the country.
The prosecution has asked that she be sentenced to 12 years in prison. After Cristina’s pronouncement, held by videoconference, the court announced that the decision will be announced on December 6.
“This court is a firing squad,” said the vice president, for whom the sentence has already been defined: “I just didn’t know it would be so poorly written.” Cristina’s line of defense hits the nail on the head with the argument that she is a victim of “lawfare”—that is, judges would persecute her for political reasons.
The vice president also accuses prosecutors Diego Luciani and Sergio Mola of being biased and said that they “could be star journalists for Clarín or La Nación”, the two main news publications in Argentina, with an editorial line critical of Kirchnerism. .
Speaking of the “firing squad”, Cristina recalls the Trelew Massacre, in 1972, when the Armed Forces executed prisoners who belonged to the left-wing armed organizations Montoneros and the People’s Revolutionary Army. “Neither then nor now have they been able to prove the allegations.”
In the “causa vialidad”, as the lawsuit became known, Cristina and 13 other people are accused of directing to the company Austral Construcciones funds intended for public works in the province of Santa Cruz, of which Néstor was governor. The company belongs to Lázaro Baez, also a defendant in this lawsuit and already convicted in another, for corruption, as well as former Minister of Development Julio De Vido.
According to the Attorney General’s Office, there were irregularities in 51 of the public works carried out in Santa Cruz by Austral, and Cristina was allegedly “head of an illicit association and fraudulent management that caused damage to the public administration”. The request for a 12-year sentence, said prosecutor Luciani, is due to “the magnitude of the crimes committed, the means employed and the extent of damage over time”.
This Tuesday, Cristina also made a defense of her administration in comparison with that of her successor, Mauricio Macri, whom she accuses of involvement with the so-called “cotton candy gang”, which tried to murder her in front of her house, in September , since the leader of the Federal Revolution, a group of right-wing extremists, worked for businessman Nicolás Caputo, the former president’s best friend.
“Do you really believe that my government committed fraud against the public administration? We, who delivered a country without debt and in which living conditions were much better?”, she said, pointing to Macri, who asked for a loan of US$ 56 billion to the IMF. “Those who really committed crimes during the administration are now without any problems with the Justice, they are in Qatar, watching the World Cup.”
Macri traveled to the country in the Middle East to watch the World Cup games
The deputy also presented a document to the Justice in which she claims to expose the “20 lies” of the current process.
In addition to this case, she also faces five other accusations of corruption, related to the alleged use of hotels owned by the Kirchner family, in Patagonia, in a scheme to embezzle public money, illicit enrichment and evasion of foreign exchange. The couple’s children, now deputy Máximo Kirchner and Florencia Kirchner, are also accused of involvement and could be sentenced to prison.
As a deputy, Cristina has immunity, so she could not be arrested immediately if found guilty. It would then be necessary for Congress to vote to withdraw this protection.
The day before the presentation of the defense, Cristina asked supporters not to hold public demonstrations and preferred to make her statement online, from her office in the Senate.
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