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.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news. All donations are still being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000 until April 24.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
