BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — An Argentine decide on Thursday ordered that the seven Iranians and three Lebanese residents accused of involvement within the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires face trial in absentia for the primary time within the long-running case tormented by setbacks and controversy.
For years Argentine courts have ordered that the suspects — Iranian former officers and Lebanese nationals — be apprehended and introduced earlier than a decide as a result of Argentina by no means allowed trials in absentia.
Previous efforts to encourage overseas governments to arrest the suspects, together with an influential advisor to Iran’s supreme chief, on the premise of Interpol purple alerts never gained traction.
However right-wing President Javier Milei, a loyal ally of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and fierce critic of Iran who studies the Torah with a rabbi regardless of being born Catholic, pushed a invoice by means of Congress earlier this 12 months that authorizes trials in absentia for fugitives which have lengthy sought to evade justice — permitting Argentina to place the defendants on trial for the primary time.
On Thursday, Decide Daniel Rafecas accepted the trial in absentia following a request from the particular prosecutor’s workplace liable for investigating the 1994 assault, the deadliest within the South American nation’s historical past, which killed 85 folks two years after a separate bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires killed 22 folks.
Rafecas described the trial as the one method to keep away from impunity now greater than 30 years after the bombing.
“Trial in absentia, nonetheless restricted, stays a device that permits us, on the very least, to try to uncover the reality, reconstruct what occurred, and, above all, give these representing the victims a spot to specific themselves publicly on this course of,” he wrote in his ruling.
Final 12 months, a excessive court docket in Argentina ruled that the Iranian government had masterminded the 1994 assault on the middle, identified by its acronym AMIA, and that members of Lebanon’s Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah had carried it out.
Iran has lengthy denied any involvement within the assaults.
Among the many seven Iranians who’re topic to Argentine arrest warrants are former Intelligence Minister Ali Fallahian, former commander of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard Mohsen Rezaei and former Overseas Minister Ali Akbar Velayati, who now advises Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The three Lebanese residents embody Salman Raouf Salman, who allegedly coordinated the assault, and fellow Hezbollah members Abdallah Salman and Hussein Mounir Mouzannar. All have been declared in contempt of court docket, in some instances many years in the past.
Advancing the AMIA case has been a key purpose of Milei, who concluded a visit to Jerusalem on June 12, the evening earlier than Israel launched its unprecedented air campaign focusing on Iran’s nuclear websites and navy management.
Milei escalated his rhetoric towards Iran and in help of Israel throughout the 12-day struggle between the regional foes, calling the Islamic republic “an enemy of Argentina” and praising Israel as “saving Western civilization.”
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