Argentina ex-leader Kirchner to be tried for corruption
BUENOS AIRES: Former Argentina president Cristina Kirchner, who has been accused of receiving tens of millions of dollars in bribes during her term in office, will go on trial for corruption, a federal court confirmed on Thursday.
Kirchner is accused of running a criminal network at the heart of the infamous “corruption notebooks” scandal – bribes paid by businessmen to government officials, revealed through the meticulous records kept by a ministerial chauffeur.
The court accepted a request by Judge Claudio Bonadio that Kirchner, now a senator, be held in pre-trial detention, but her partial parliamentary immunity prevents that from happening.
That immunity protects her from imprisonment – but not from prosecution.
In August, the Senate voted to partially lift her immunity so that investigators could search her three luxury homes – but unless it is entirely lifted, she cannot be jailed even if found guilty.
The court also seized 1.5 billion pesos (US$38 million) worth of her assets and ordered former planning minister Julio de Vido, now in pre-trial detention, to be prosecuted.
Several other former junior ministers and businessmen were ordered to be released from detention but will still be tried on bribery charges.
Both Kirchner, 65, and her late husband and predecessor as president, Nestor, are suspected of having received millions of dollars in bribes from businessmen in exchange for large-scale public works contracts.
The payments were documented by driver Oscar Centeno in notebooks seized by investigators. — AFP