By Sebastián Lacunza
Editor-in-Chief
Editor-in-Chief
@sebalacunza
In 1983 Raúl Alfonsín inherited intelligence services that had recently participated in one of the most serious massacres of the 20th century in Latin America. One of the dictatorship’s repressors, the intelligence agent Raúl Guglielminetti, was even part of the presidential security detail. Facing the difficult task of reconstructing democracy, Alfonsín did not know how to, did not want to, or wasn’t able to transform the State Intelligence Secretariat (SIDE, now the Intelligence Secretariat, SI). While Alfonsín’s government was surrounded by military mobs and multiple conspiracies, intelligence wolves were linked to kidnappings.
Meanwhile, the Peronist opposition accused the SIDE of organizing disturbances to besmirch the massive protests at the Plaza de Mayo. Once again, the dark hand of the intelligence services appeared in the public debate.
Under the conservative Peronist Carlos Menem the Argentine intelligence world reached unprecedented proportions.
The “envelopes” for journalists and media groups became the stuff of legend. Not everything was done by envelopes. They also exploited infamous videos to extort, some of which had a federal judge who had served under all of the governments, including the current one, as a protagonist. Ending the Menem era, the notorious “insecurity problem” became a megatheme in the public agenda with guidance from the “damned police.” The intelligence services, once again, watched it all pass by. From 1994 onward, the SIDE actively worked on the AMIA case, sullying it in the process.
Conservative Radical Fernando de la Rúa’s administration, which arrived in power with the promise to make government transparent, featured an uncontrolled increase in funds for the SIDE — and was denounced by his fellow Radical Alfonsín. The period featured the occasional magazine cover against one of the government’s internal enemies but nothing as important as the role that state Intelligence played in paying bribes to senators so that a draconian labour reform could be passed. Bribes that for the Argentine courts never existed.
And then we have the Kirchners. The president has just discovered a pit of venomous snakes that is able to commit the worst acts. The ruling party suggests that the espionage mafia could have coerced a prosecutor and pushed him to accuse the head of state of orchestrating a “criminal conspiracy” to cover-up the alleged perpetrators of that terrorist attack against the AMIA.
That same mafia could have, according to Government House, murdered Prosecutor Alberto Nisman or pushed him to commit suicide.
It has already been said, with evident truth, the argument the government uses places it in an uncomfortable position. Those groups that are now considered part of a mafia played a central role in the administration of the Intelligence services until December.
If Antonio Stiusso, Nisman’s main information supplier, is responsible for all of those sins after more than three decades of operations and counter-intelligence, it is not necessary to elaborate just how much he could have done during 12 years of relationships with the legal branch and other elements of power. Operations targeting rivals, be they serious, clumsy or even bizarre, have accompanied Kirchnerism since 2003.
Two serious organizations, the Association for Civil Rights (ADC) and the Centre for Legal and Social Studies (CELS), made their positions on the intelligence services known this week. Both agree on highlighting the relative autonomy that Argentine spies enjoy, a feature that has remained unchanged since 1983. A frequent paradox is that some of those who appear as victims of shadowy intelligence, be they judges, prosecutors or journalists, also emerge as the primary users of their dark services. A situation in which accusations against a system that is essentially anti-democratic become entrapped in their own labyrinth.
President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, a head of state that must be putting all of the state’s resources to ascertaining the circumstances of Nisman’s death, this week made statements through Facebook. Commentator-in-Chief was the Herald’s columnist Marcelo García’s lucid description.
In one of those comments, she addressed the Herald’s front page that reported on the notorious argumentative weakness of prosecutor Nisman’s accusation.
In effect this newspaper has a rigorous journalist as the main writer on the issue in Luciana Bertoia, and as editors we have ascertained that the accusation by the prosecutor alleging an orchestrated impunity to lift the “red notices” against the suspects and to increase bilateral trade has not been substantiated. Not only because it was clearly denied by a former head of Interpol, but because the complete accusation — released on Tuesday by the Supreme Court’s Centre for Judicial Information (CIJ) — is based on speculation, press clippings and wiretaps of questionable value.
Ariel Lijo will decide on the request for the president, foreign minister and other officials to be interrogated. Perhaps, and no one should rule this out, the result will be the indictment of a network of influence-peddlers or an espionage ring made up of shady individuals with scarce influence. The government must take accountability for that. Meanwhile, at the Herald we believe that the best way to be independent is to maintain our commitment to the facts and respect our readers.
As this paper goes to press, Damián Pachter — a young journalist that works for BuenosAiresHerald.com and was the first to report the news of Nisman’s death from his personal Twitter account around midnight last Sunday — will be abroad. Damián had the great presence of mind to trust a key source. Before he left he told the website Infobae.com that he had information that his life was in danger and for that reason he was compelled to leave the country at dawn on Saturday. Apparently the intelligence wolves are still loose. The Herald will investigate the threats reported by Pachter and will demand that he be granted the security that he deserves.
@sebalacunza