MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Cristina Fernandez admits few European countries are a flying option for her
Fears that Tango 01 could be impounded on request from the hedge funds or ‘vulture funds’ President Cristina Fernandez revealed during the Mercosur summit in Uruguay on Friday that as a result of the judicial dispute between Argentina and the hedge funds, a few countries in Europe are not a flying option for her.
The Argentine president made the admission during her speech to her peers in support of Mercosur unity and condemning the attitude of four European countries that denied their air space to Bolivian president Evo Morales who was forced to land in Vienna and wait thirteen hours.
“I am going to be extremely sincere. I cannot fly to some countries in Europe with my presidential airplane, because there might be a judge who will dispose a seizure order after a ‘vulture fund’ request”, explained Fernández de Kirchner.
“If I am aboard, I don't know if they won't seize me as well,” she said. “There are new forms of colonialism, more subtle than those practiced centuries ago.”
After joking that probably they would keep the plane and let her go “To the disappointment of the opposition in my country”, Cristina Fernandez insisted that “we still see people that want to disunite us, they want to divide us, so they can take our natural resources”.
In October, Argentina suffered a similar situation when Ghana’s justice ordered the detention of the frigate “ARA Libertad” naval ship, due to a hedge fund request that holds Argentine defaulted bonds and demands full payment of capital and interest.
ARA Libertad, the flagship of the Argentine navy was impounded for two months because of the demand from a Cayman based investment firm alleging Buenos Aires owes it 370 million dollars.
In January, the Argentine government had to rent a British aircraft for Kirchner's trip to Cuba, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia and Vietnam for fear that her official plane would be impounded in a debt dispute.
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Read all commentsWow, the poor woman is restricted to taking first class flights with the plebeians. Or are there countries that cancel scheduled aircraft flights when they know she is coming. As for Morales if he hand't made public statements that led people to think he might try and illegally take a fugitive through a countries airspace then perhaps he wouldn't have had his flight plans blocked. She can't bear to travel with the mere first class passengers because they might lynch her, so has to have her own plane even though the country cant pay its bills and he can't keep his mouth shut and then will not accept the consequences of what he says. Were these really the winning candidates of a presidential election in modern civilised democracies.
Jul 13th, 2013 - 01:47 pm 0Why is Europe above the law RICO? Why can they grant asylum to people other countries in Africa and Middle East want?
Jul 13th, 2013 - 01:53 pm 0@1 “Wow, the poor woman is restricted to taking first class flights with the plebeians.”
Jul 13th, 2013 - 02:06 pm 0Who says she's flying business. I can see her desperately walking through the coach cabin (where she belongs) with her middle seat boarding pass telling people in the aisles and windows, “excuse me, I'm traveling with this [points to sad person in middle seat-who unlike her doesn't have the chutzpah to try it] person, will you please switch with me?” .... “excuse me, I'm traveling with this person...”
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