Argentina says prosecutor killed by rogue intelligence agents

Sara Garfunkel, mother of late prosecutor Alberto Nisman, leaves the office of prosecutor Viviana Fein, who is investigating Nisman's death, in Buenos Aires January 22, 2015. | Photo: Reuters

Government officials said Friday that rogue agents from Argentina's own intelligence services were behind the death of Alberto Nisman, a state prosecutor and lead investigator in the deadly 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center that killed 85 people and injured hundreds in Buenos Aires.

Nisman had been scheduled to appear before Congress on Monday to answer questions regarding his report on the attack, but he was found dead in his apartment just hours before he was to speak.

His death – and the array of conspiracy theories surrounding it – have rocked Argentina this week.

Authorities now say his death is linked to a power struggle at the intelligence agency, pointing to agents who had recently been fired.

"When he was alive they needed him to present the charges against the president. Then, undoubtedly, it was useful to have him dead," the president's chief of staff, Anibal Fernandez, said on Friday. Fernandez also took to the social media, questioning whether Nisman’s [note]suicide had actually been written by the attorney.

Cables revealed by Wikileaks suggest that Nisman was being advised by U.S. and Israeli intelligence services, and Argentina officials investigating Nisman’s death say the attorney’s 300-page report indicate that he was manipulated and being fed false information.

President Cristina Fern ández, whose husband and late President Nestor Kirchner ordered the investigation into the AMIA bombing, was quick to cast doubt on the apparent suicide of the attorney.

People close to Nisman have also questioned the suicide ruling from the initial autopsy, with his friends and family describing him as upbeat ahead of his scheduled appearance before Congress Monday. Nisman borrowed a handgun – the same one he allegedly used to commit suicide – the day before his death, after receiving a call from a former intelligence officer who had been his primary source of information in his investigation.

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