Scandal Spreads Over Illegal Intelligence Activities in Argentina

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The investigations into the illegal activities of the Argentinean Federal Intelligence Service (AFI) during the rule of the conservative President Mauricio Macri (2015-2019) are uncovering a growing body of new evidence. At the Federal Court of Lomas de Zamora in the province of Buenos Aires, investigations are currently underway against purported members of an illegal espionage network within the AFI.

They are being accused of having systematically spied on politicians, judges, journalists, entrepreneurs, clergymen, trade unionists, and social activists for years, with no legal authorization. Those concerned have been monitored in their professional and private lives, photographs and video files have been compiled on them, telephone conversations have been intercepted and messages read.

The group is said to have comprised at least 18 people, who in internal communications referred to themselves as “SuperMarioBros”. In addition to police officers, intelligence officers, attorneys and journalists, drug dealers, and members of organized soccer fan groups, the so-called “barras bravas”, were also involved in the network.

The group was exposed through the testimony of an imprisoned drug dealer. He testified that he had been instigated by an AFI attorney and agent in a bomb attack against a former Defense Department official during the Macri government. In return, he was promised free rein in his drug dealings and an identity card that would identify him as an AFI agent.

In the course of subsequent investigations, the authorities confiscated several mobile phones of alleged network members. The data, photos, and conversations stored on them provide a comprehensive picture of the illegal espionage activities.

The victims include opponents as well as members and supporters of the former government under President Macri. Ex-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner was also under surveillance, as were individual members of the Macri Party PRO, including the Mayor of Buenos Aires, Rodríguez Larreta, and the former Governor of the Province of Buenos Aires, María Eugenia Vidal.

The court papers also accuse the PRO of systematically monitoring former members of the Kirchner government or close businessmen who are currently in jail for alleged corruption crimes. There, their conversations with attorneys and relatives are said to have been illegally intercepted in order to use them as a means of exerting pressure to incriminate former President Kirchner.

In a first reaction, Kirchner spoke of an “unprecedented scandal” and held Mauricio Macri personally liable. She also stressed the complicity of the Supreme Court and the media in disclosing the illegally recorded information. In contrast, Macri’s confidants do not believe in his direct involvement at this time.

However, in the background, observers see increasing conflict between different factions within Macri’s PRO party.

On another front, ex-President Macri is facing new charges against him, based on a new explosive finding in the AFI’s files. After a hard disk with illegally intercepted e-mails from over 80 public figures was recently discovered, investigators have now come across equally illegally stored secret service files on some 500 people.

The files were compiled prior to two major political events during Macris’ reign: the 2017 meeting of the World Trade Organization and the 2018 G20 summit. The secret service was particularly interested in the political views of the individuals concerned.

In her complaint to the Prosecutor’s Office, the current head of the AFI, Cristina Caamaño, stresses that the secret service investigations in question were not commissioned or authorized by any court. It was therefore illegal espionage, which was conducted with the explicit acquiescence of the politically responsible individuals. The files served as the basis for the accreditation or rejection of the two political events.

The majority of those affected are journalists from different countries, but also academics, NGO representatives, and social activists. Union membership, support for the right to abortion, or the denunciation of police violence could become grounds for expulsion of the affected individuals.

President Alberto Fernández commented on the current case: “I have an obligation to Argentine society to close down these threats to democracy permanently. We will not allow the resources of the state secret service to be used to the detriment of Argentine citizens, no matter what they think”.

Source: Amerika21