Eleven other former officials and people close to Fernández’s government will also be tried on charges of cover-up and abuse of power, the federal judge Claudio Bonadio said in a ruling released on Monday by Argentina’s official judicial information center (CIJ).
The trial date has not been set.
So far, four of the accused have been detained. In December, Bonadio asked lawmakers to remove Fernández’s immunity from prosecution, which she gained last year when she was sworn in as a senator. Legislators have not acted on the request.
The immunity protects her from being arrested, but she can still be tried.
The 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association center in Buenos Aires killed 85 people and wounded hundreds. Iran denies any involvement.
Fernández, who was president from 2007 to 2015, denies any wrongdoing or involvement in any cover-up involving Argentina’s worst terror attack.
The judge backed an assertion against Fernández made on 14 January 2015, by Alberto Nisman, a prosecutor who was investigating the case.
Nisman said the 2013 agreement that Fernández’s government made with Iran in exchange for favorable deals on oil and other goods ensured that Iranian officials involved in the attack would escape prosecution.
Nisman was found dead in his apartment with a bullet wound in his right temple four days later. His case remains unsolved. But last year, an investigation by Argentina’s border police agency concluded that Nisman was murdered, contradicting earlier official findings that Nisman had probably killed himself.
Source: theguardian
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