In response to allegations of corruption during her two terms as president, Argentina’s public prosecutor demanded on Monday that Vice President Cristina Kirchner receive a 12-year prison term and a lifetime ban from holding elective office.
Kirchner, 69, is accused of fraudulently awarding public works contracts in her Patagonia fiefdom, but even if convicted, she would not face jail time because she enjoys parliamentary immunity as an elected senator.
She could lose her parliamentary immunity in two ways: if she loses her senate seat in the next election, or if the Supreme Court upholds an eventual guilty verdict.
Minutes after public prosecutor Diego Luciani’s request was made public, President Alberto Fernandez’s office issued a statement condemning Kirchner’s “judicial and media persecution.”
“None of the actions attributed to the ex-president have been proven, and the entire accusation is based solely on the function she exercised at the time, which unfortunately degrades the most fundamental principles of modern criminal law.”
Kirchner’s eight years in office from 2007 to 2015, as well as the four years before that when her late husband Nestor Kirchner, who died in 2010, was president, were all investigated.
