MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Domingo Cavallo free

Former economy minister Domingo Cavallo walked free after an appeals court overturned last Friday his previous indictment on charges of smuggling weapons to Ecuador and Croatia last decade, ending his 65-day confinement in Campo de Mayo.

Appeals Court Judges Carlos Pizzatelli, Marcos Grabivker and Roberto Hornos repealed the indictment warrant issued by Penal Economic Judge Julio Speroni, who arrested the 55-year old former financial tsar on April 3, and severely commanded the judge "to abstain in future from unfairly distracting action from what constitutes court decisions." Speroni had accused Cavallo of being a prime accomplice in the illegal sale of Argentine weapons to Ecuador and Croatia between 1991 and 1995 when, as economy minister for Peronist president Carlos Menem, Cavallo was also in charge of the nation's Customs Office.

The former minister regained freedom exactly a year after Menem was detained under the charges of heading the alleged racket of illegally selling arms. The Supreme Court later ruled that there was no such criminal ring and Menem walked free after spending five months under house arrest in the home of a wealthy friend, in the outskirts of Buenos Aires. Several other former officials and Menem former aides had also been indicted in connection to the case but subsequently released.

Cavallo also served as Economy Minister for Alliance President Fernando de la Rúa, who was toppled amid widespread protests last December, days after clamping tough banking restrictions that have since frozen billions of dollars of savings in bank coffers to prevent a collapse of the financial system as Argentina struggles with one of its worst economic crisis in history.

When news about his imminent release became public angry savers smeared banks in Buenos Aires with garbage and paint. "The appeals court ruling restores our confidence in the judiciary," said in a statement Acción para la República, AR, a political grouping that responds to Mr. Cavallo and has a minimal congressional representation. ??This is a very good decision and makes clear that the investigating judge does not have anything to go on,'' said Cavallo's attorney, Alfredo Castañón, reiterating his claim that investigators never had evidence against his client. ??Of course, Cavallo is innocent. There is no proof whatsoever that he did anything wrong,'' he added.

Cavallo was one of Menem's leading cabinet ministers, and was accused of signing a decree that approved the arms sales.

The shipments to Croatia and Ecuador between 1991 and 1995 took place while those countries were subject to an arms embargo under United Nations agreements. Ecuador and Peru waged a brief border war in the 1990s and Argentina was a peace guarantor since the conflict first erupted in 1940.

The operation involved in the diversion of 6,500 tons of weapons worth more than 100 million dollars that had been officially destined for Panama and Venezuela.

Mr. Cavallo, a Harvard-trained economist with an international reputation, and his supporters have denounced the charges as politically motivated, saying his detention was intended to distract attention from the country's economic crisis.