MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Seven years after, death of Argentine special prosecutor and alleged Iran connection remain unresolved

Nisman was a special prosecutor appointed to try to establish the alleged connection of Iran in two bomb attacks against Israelite targets in Buenos Aires

On a rainy evening Tuesday 18th January, dozens toured the streets of Buenos Aires in memory of the prosecutor Alberto Nisman on the occasion of the seventh anniversary of his death, a case which remains unresolved by Argentine justice. With umbrellas, dressed in black some carrying candles, flashlights, and flowers, the march reached the Le Parc flats complex, in a posh area of Buenos Aires, where Nisman was found dead with a shot in the head, and an investigation that still has to decide if it was a homicide or suicide.

Nisman was a special prosecutor, appointed by ex president Nestor Kirchner to try to establish the alleged connection of Iran in two bomb attacks against Israelite targets in downtown Buenos Aires which left over a hundred people killed and hundreds more maimed.

The Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations , DAIA, of which one of its organizations, AMIA, was a target of the bombing published a video on social network to remember the deceased prosecutor.

“I was with Alberto Nisman three days before his death. Nisman was not suicidal. Nisman was an enthusiastic researcher. Nisman did not commit suicide”, underlined the president of the DAIA, Jorge Knoblovits.

Nisman was found dead on January 18, 2015 in the bathroom of his apartment, hours before appearing before Congress to explain the complaint he had filed four days earlier against the former president and current vice president of the country, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.

The special prosecutor for the case investigating the 1994 attack on the AMIA, had publicly denounced in the media that Cristina Fernández and other members of her cabinet for the alleged cover-up of the Iranians accused of the terrorist attack, through an MOU, memorandum of understanding signed between Argentina and Iran in 2013. The MOU allegedly was to promote bilateral trade in exchange for dropping charges against the Iranian officials.

But seven years later an Argentine Federal Court dismissed the case considering the MOU “did not constitute a crime”. Currently the case is analyzing thousands of calls before and after the death of Nisman in the vicinity of his flat, apparently involving members of Argentine intelligence services.

Nevertheless AMIA has demanded the complete elucidation of the circumstances surrounding the special prosecutor's death“ and argues that it does not alter the hypothesis of homicide as the most probable cause of death. A position also supported by Israel, where Nisman's memory was also remembered.

Knoblovits was quoted by the media saying during the march saying that ”in Argentina there's too much impunity“.

In 2007, then Israeli prime minister said in an interview with CNN, ”that Iran is behind the two attacks in Buenos Aires, against the Israeli embassy and the AMIA, is indisputable, and I'm sure that Mr. Nisman was very close in his investigation and we can't discard that Iran could have also been somehow involved in his tragic death”