MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina strongly protests President Mujica remarks about Nestor and Cristina Kirchner

Comments are “unacceptable, denigrating and offend the memory of a dead person” said the release in reference to Nestor Kirchner

Uruguayan president José Mujica’s controversial statements caught on an open microphone referred to President Cristina Fernandez and her late husband Nestor Kirchner, triggered a strong response from the Argentine government saying that such comments are “unacceptable, denigrating and offend the memory of a dead person”.

A few hours after Mujica was ‘caught’ on Thursday following a local press conference saying that “the old lady in worse than the crossed eye man”, the Argentine Foreign ministry summoned Uruguayan ambassador Guillermo Pomi and presented him with a written protest letter.

“The Foreign Ministry would like to let the Uruguayan Embassy know of the deep discomfort created by President José Mujica’s statements regarding late President Néstor Kirchner”.

The statement released by the Foreign Ministry adds that “it is unacceptable for Argentina that these denigrating statements that offend the memory and office of a dead person, unable to reply or defend himself, were particularly made by someone who Dr. Kirchner considered his friend.”

The statement also said that President Cristina Fernández “would not be making any statements on the matter or the grievances”.

“The Ministry considers that the historic relationship that binds both nations should not be affected by expressions that offend those who represented the Argentine Republic and its people,” the statement indicated.

On Thursday afternoon Mujica visited a dairy and cattle farming area and was talking about the difficult trade relations with the senior Mercosur partners Brazil and Argentina, which was followed by a brief press conference.

But believing the event was over the microphones caught Mujica when he referred to Cristina Fernandez as the ‘old lady’ and former president Kirchner as ‘the crossed eye man’, which immediately caught Argentine media headlines.

But Mujica who was arguing that ‘to obtain something from Argentina’ (in trade terms) it was necessary to first dialogue with Brazil, in reality was kinder to Kirchner than to Cristina Fernandez: ‘she’s stubborn, he was more of a politician”.

Apparently during the talks with local officials and farmers Mujica also made some comments about the recent meeting of Cristina Fernandez and Pope Francis: “to an Argentine pope, who has lived 77 years in Argentina you are going to explain to him what a ‘mate’ and a ‘thermos’ are?”.

Mujica was referring to Cristina Fernandez’ gift to Francis: a ‘mate’, or hollow gourd with a metal straw from which a local infusion tea of ‘yerba’ is sipped. Drinking ‘mate’ is widely extended in Uruguay, Argentina, south of Brazil, Paraguay and certain areas of Bolivia and Peru.

President Mujica’s first reaction to the storm that his words erupted was to say that the press conference and dialogue with farmers was referred to agriculture, cattle, dairy farming “and not Argentina, so there is nothing to clarify”.

However it is anticipated that Foreign minister Luis Almagro will be involved in some serious fence mending since the lady is most jealous and irritable when it comes to the memory of her late husband to whom in some speeches she refers to as “He” or “Him”.

For Mujica it is another exercise of frustration in his attempt to establish a civilized dialogue with the administration of President Cristina Fernandez so as to move ahead in several joint projects, and is also further confirmation of his disenchantment with Mercosur and growing impediments to inter-regional trade.