The ex wife of Argentine late prosecutor Alberto Nisman, federal judge in San Isidro Sandra Arroyo Salgado, leaves the prosecutor’s office after giving testimony to prosecutor Viviana Fein for more than eight hours, in Buenos Aires.
Agencies/Buenos Aires
A colleague who says he gave a gun to an Argentine prosecutor found fatally shot earlier this week has been barred from leaving the country, justice officials in Buenos Aires said.
Authorities said Diego Lagomarsino, a computer expert and colleague who said he brought prosecutor Alberto Nisman a handgun Saturday night at his request, has been barred from leaving Argentina.
Nisman was found dead with a a bullet to the head in his Buenos Aires home Sunday, just before he was to go before a congressional hearing to accuse president Cristina Kirchner of shielding Iranian officials implicated in a bomb attack on a Jewish community center in 1994 that left 85 dead.
Investigators, who initially said he appeared to have committed suicide, have not ruled out homicide or “induced suicide”, while Kirchner has said she believes Nisman was murdered in a plot to implicate her government in a cover-up.
Prosecutor Viviana Fein, who is leading the investigation, said yesterday in a statement that investigators are “waiting for completion of ballistics analysis, including a DNA comparison and to see whether the bullet taken from the body corresponds to the .22-caliber weapon found at the scene”.
Before his demise, Nisman had filed a 280-page complaint charging that Kirchner had issued an “express directive” to shield a group of Iranian suspects in the 1994 bombing.
Nisman contended that the government had agreed to swap grain for oil with Tehran in exchange for withdrawing “red notices” to Interpol seeking the arrests of the former and current Iranian officials accused in the unsolved case.
The United States has called for a “complete and impartial” investigation into the death of Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman.
Investigators have said he appeared to have committed suicide—though they have not ruled out homicide or “induced suicide.”
Nisman “courageously devoted much of his professional life” to going after those responsible for the attack in Buenos Aires, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.
“Judicial authorities are investigating his death and we call for a complete and impartial investigation.
“For over 20 years, the United States... we have continued to work closely with the international community and the Argentine government seeking justice.”
Meanwhile a report by the newspaper Clarin has analysed the involvement of Iranian intelligence in the bomb attack.
Given Iran’s record, the intelligence community worldwide is now wondering about the possibility — entirely theoretical at the moment — that Iranian agents or their allies might have had some role in the death of Nisman. Most agree that the accusations he was about to make public would have been harmful to Iranian interests.
Questions abound. Could Iranian intelligence have pushed Nisman toward suicide by threatening to kill one of his children? Did they have information that was damaging to the prosecutor? Did they penetrate the security cordon of Nisman’s residential block in the Puerto Madero district, using an agent who could stage a suicide without raising suspicions?