Police sentries guarded the federal prosecutor’s luxury high-rise building. His door on the 13th floor had been locked from the inside, and a gun with a spent cartridge was found on the floor near his body. There was no suicide note.
Just one day earlier, on Saturday, the prosecutor, Alberto Nisman, said, “I might get out of this dead.”
From the moment 10 years ago when he was assigned to investigate the 1994 suicide bombing of a Jewish center here that left 85 people dead, Mr. Nisman, an even-keeled lawyer, became entangled in a labyrinthine plot that he traced to Iran and its militant Lebanese ally, Hezbollah.
But it was only in the past week that Mr. Nisman, 51, leveled explosive accusations that top Argentine officials, including President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, had conspired with Iran to cover up responsibility for the bombing as part of a deal that would supply Iranian oil to Argentina. Now, the mystery has deepened with the discovery of Mr. Nisman’s body on Sunday — the day before he was to testify before lawmakers about those accusations.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Something smells rotten in the city of Buenos Aires. Certainly, it could have been a suicide. But his having come all this way, it doesn't seem probable that he would do that.
This is the kind of thing that used to happen when military juntas controlled countries in Latin America and elsewhere. It certainly could be a black mark on the government, and the ensuing investigation, assumed the whole thing isn't covered up and the new prosecutor manages to survive, could lead to wholesale firings and resignations.