Press TV – May 16, 2014
Argentina has vowed to appeal a decision by a federal court that rejected an agreement between the Latin American country and Iran over a joint probe into a bombing of a Buenos Aires Jewish center.
On Thursday, an Argentinean federal court struck down a 2013 agreement between the South American country and Iran to jointly investigate deadly attacks on a Jewish center in Argentina in 1994.
Alberto Nisman, a prosecutor in the investigation of the AMIA center explosion, in which 85 people were killed, had argued in his appeal to the court that the 2013 agreement constituted an “undue interference of the executive branch in the exclusive sphere of the judiciary.” The ruling by the federal court against the agreement said that it was illegal and ordered Argentina not to go ahead with it, according to the Reuters.
After the decision was announced, Argentina’s Foreign Minister Hector Timerman said that the ruling was “a mistake” and that the government will take the case to the country’s Supreme Court of Justice.
“I would like to say that the judges take stock in what their mistake means at a national level and at an international level,” Timerman said. “Regarding the decision, Argentina will appeal the mistake and, if necessary, take it to the nation’s Supreme Court of Justice,” he added.
Meanwhile, Justice Minister Julio Alak also said that a final decision was left to the Supreme Court. “The ultimate interpreter of the constitution will be the Supreme Court,” he said.
Under intense political pressure imposed by the US and Israel, Argentina formerly accused Iran of having carried out the 1994 bombing attack on the AMIA building. AMIA stands for the Asociacion Mutual Israelita Argentina or the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association.
Iran has categorically and consistently denied any involvement in the terrorist bombing.
Last January, Tehran and Buenos Aires signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly probe the 1994 bombing.