Argentine Jews Tap Expert as Bombing Panel Advisor
A former International Criminal Court prosecutor is the new advisor for the Argentinean Jewish community on the truth commission formed with Iran.
Luis Gabriel Moreno Ocampo, former prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, will help DAIA, the Argentinean Jewish political umbrella, to supervise the memorandum that the Argentinean government signed a week ago with Iran related to the 1994 AMIA Jewish community center bombing case.
Moreno Ocampo asked the country’s Jewish leaders to invite representatives of AMIA and relatives of the victims in order to agree in one voice and one legal opinion about the memorandum and its consequences.
News of his hiring was leaked on Saturday night. Jewish leaders told JTA that Moreno Ocampo will meet the representatives of DAIA on Feb. 14
The one voice requirement seems to be a difficult condition. In recent days, a vigorous debate surrounding the agreement has erupted between AMIA and DAIA. AMIA rejects the agreement signed a week ago, after first rejecting then accepting it. That trigged a clash with the Jewish political umbrella DAIA. “You can’t change your mind three times in 72 hours,” Waldo Wolff, vice president of DAIA told journalists during an unprecedented public confrontation between DAIA and one of the institutions that it represents.
When the announcement of the memorandum was made Jan. 27, AMIA President Guillermo Borger opposed because “we don’t trust Iran”
On Jan. 29, Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman met at the AMIA building with the heads of AMIA, DAIA and victims’ families to explain the agreement signed with Iran which would create a truth commission, which allows Argentine Judges to question Iran’s suspects in Tehran. After that meeting Borger expressed satisfaction with the agreement.
On Friday, however, Borger, confirmed his rejection of the deal signed between Argentina and Iran to create an independent international truth commission in the investigation of the 1994 AMIA terrorist attack.
Argentina and Iran signed an agreement to form an independent commission to investigate the 1994 bombing of the Buenos Aires Jewish community center. The pact was signed by the foreign ministers of the two countries Jan. 27 in Ethiopia on the sidelines of an African Union summit in Addis Ababa. The parliaments of both countries must ratify the agreement, which creates a Commission of Truth consisting of five independent judges, none from either Argentina or Iran. Suspects may be interrogated by Argentinean justice officials, but only in Tehran.
Moreno Ocampo reportedly will now try to build a united position and a legal view about the memorandum and its consequences.
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