The Argentine Supreme Court’s ruling against former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner prevents the Peronist leader from running for deputy in the Buenos Aires provincial elections on September 7 and leaves her one step away from jail. On Tuesday, the three judges who make up Argentina’s highest court unanimously dismissed all appeals and upheld the six-year prison sentence and perpetual ban from holding public office handed down by lower courts for finding her guilty of fraudulent administration to the detriment of the state in the awarding of public works concessions in the Patagonian province of Santa Cruz, in the so-called Vialidad Case. These are the next steps in a historic judicial process that has sent shockwaves through Argentine politics.

When will Kirchner be arrested?

For the execution of the sentence upheld by the Supreme Court, the case returns to the court of origin, in this case the Second Federal Oral Court (TOF2) of the city of Buenos Aires. Its president, Jorge Gorini, was responsible for notifying Kirchner and the other eight convicted defendants that they have five business days, expiring next Wednesday, to appear before the court. At that time, they will be detained and begin serving their sentences.

What happens if you don’t appear in court?

If Kirchner fails to appear before the court within the prescribed period, the court may order her arrest by law enforcement. It may also order this if it deems her a flight risk.

Where will she serve her sentence?

The president of the TOF2 has requested that the Ministry of Security assign a federal forces facility that meets the appropriate conditions for housing the former president and the other convicts. Judge Gorini clarifies that “the specific individual characteristics” of each convict must be addressed and given consideration.

Can she request house arrest?

Yes, although it’s not automatic. Argentine law allows the courts to grant the benefit of house arrest to those aged over 70. Kirchner’s defense team can request it, invoking this requirement, as she turned 72 on February 19. The courts must decide whether to grant it, but it’s assumed they will. If so, the opposition leader is expected to opt for her home in the Buenos Aires neighborhood of Constitución instead of the one she has in El Calafate, almost 3,000 kilometers (1,865 miles) south of Buenos Aires.

What’s happening with her candidacy for deputy?

The Peronist leader had announced that she would run for deputy in the legislative elections scheduled for September 7 in the province of Buenos Aires, the largest and most populous in Argentina. However, the perpetual ban from holding public office prevents the Peronist party from registering her on the electoral lists, which must be submitted before July 19. Judge Gorini ordered that the National Electoral Chamber be notified of the ban that now applies to Kirchner.

Can she appeal to international courts?

The Supreme Court is Argentina’s highest court, and Kirchner’s conviction is final, meaning she cannot appeal to any other court in the country. However, the former president claims to be a victim of judicial persecution and wants to take the case to international courts. She has six months to file a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Her lawyer, Gregorio Dalbón, has also announced that they will file complaints with the International Criminal Court and the UN Human Rights Council.

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Argentina’s highest court upheld a six-year prison sentence for former President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in a ruling Tuesday that permanently banned her from public office over the corruption conviction that found she had directed state contracts to a friend while she was the first lady and president.

The explosive Supreme Court ruling left Fernández, Argentina’s charismatic yet deeply divisive ex-leader, subject to arrest and sent her supporters pouring into the streets of Buenos Aires, Argentina’s capital, and blocking major highways in protest.

The court asked Argentina’s security ministry to set up a detention center to hold 72-year-old Fernández. Her defense lawyer Carlos Beraldi told C5N, a television station in Buenos Aires, that he had requested Fernández be allowed to serve her sentence in house arrest given her age.

The ruling bars Fernández from running in this fall’s Buenos Aires legislative elections just days after she launched her campaign.

Fernández — who dominated Argentine politics for two decades and forged the country’s main left-wing populist movement known as Kirchnerism, after her and her husband, former President Néstor Kirchner — rejects the charges as politically motivated.

During Fernández’s eight years in office (2007–2015), Argentina expanded cash payments to the poor and pioneered major social assistance programs. But her governments funded the unbridled state spending by printing money, bringing Argentina notoriety for massive budget deficits and sky-high inflation.

Critics blamed Argentina’s years of economic volatility on Fernández’s policies, and outrage over successive economic crises and the country’s bloated bureaucracy helped vault radical libertarian President Javier Milei to the presidency in late 2023.

The ruling dealt a severe blow to Milei’s opposition during a crucial midterm election year. He celebrated the ruling, writing on social media: “Justice. Period.”

Fernández was embroiled in multiple corruption scandals during her tenure. She was convicted in 2022 in this corruption case, which centered on 51 public contracts for public works awarded to companies linked to Lázaro Báez, a convicted construction magnate and friend of the presidential couple, at prices 20% above the standard rate in a scheme that cost the state tens of millions of dollars.

The high court rejected Fernández’s request for the court to review her prison sentence in March. In a resolution obtained by The Associated Press, the court said that the prison sentence “does nothing more than to protect our republican and democratic system.”

The Kirchner governments carried out “an extraordinary fraudulent maneuver” that harmed the interests of the government and resulted in the embezzlement of roughly $70 million at the current exchange rate, the resolution said.

Supporters of Fernández and her political movement blocked main roads into Buenos Aires and stormed the offices of Argentina’s two main cable networks that are widely considered critical of the ex-leader, Channel 13 and Todos Noticias, smashing televisions, vandalizing cars and shattering windows. There were no injuries reported.

Fernández rejected the decision, calling the court justices “puppets” of those wielding economic power in the country.

“They’re three puppets answering to those ruling far above them,” she told supporters in a rousing speech outside her party’s headquarters. “It’s not the opposition. It’s the concentrated economic power of Argentina’s government.”

Gregorio Dalbón, one of Fernández’s lawyers, vowed “to take this case to all international human rights organizations.”

Fernández has questioned the impartiality of the judges. She claims her defense didn’t have access to much of the evidence and that it was gathered without regard to legal deadlines.

Fernández faces a series of other upcoming trials on corruption charges.

The ruling makes her subject to arrest and bars her from running in upcoming Buenos Aires legislative elections.

Argentina’s Supreme Court has upheld a six-year prison sentence on corruption charges for former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.

The ruling on Tuesday, which permanently bars the divisive 72-year-old from public office and makes her subject to arrest, prompted crowds of her supporters to block the streets of Buenos Aires in protest.

The left-wing former president denounced the ruling, claiming the court’s judges were acting in the service of the economically powerful.

“They’re three puppets answering to those ruling far above them,” she told supporters outside her party’s headquarters in Buenos Aires, in an apparent reference to the government of her rival, President Javier Milei.

“It’s the concentrated economic power of Argentina’s government.”

The ruling was welcomed by Milei, a libertarian fiercely opposed to Fernandez de Kirchner’s brand of high-spending politics, which critics blamed for years of economic volatility and soaring inflation.

“Justice. End,” he wrote on X.

‘Abundance of evidence’

Fernandez de Kirchner, who succeeded her husband Nestor Kirchner as president in 2007 and remained in power until 2015, had been found guilty by a federal court in 2022 of having directed irregular state public works contracts to a friend during her and her husband’s years in power.

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She claimed the conviction was politically motivated and appealed to the Supreme Court.

But the judges rejected Fernandez de Kirchner’s appeal, writing in a resolution that her sentence did “nothing more than … protect our republican and democratic system”, The Associated Press news agency reported.

“The sentences handed down by the previous courts were based on the abundance of evidence produced,” the judges wrote, according to the AFP news agency.

The ruling makes her conviction and appeal definitive, and likely draws a line under her lengthy political career, just days after she launched her campaign for the Buenos Aires legislative elections in September.

The former president has five days to turn herself in to authorities, although her lawyer has requested she be able to serve her sentence under house arrest due to her age, the AP reported.

The threat of arrest mobilised the former president’s supporters around her. Daniel Dragoni, a councillor from Buenos Aires, told AFP he was “destroyed” by the ruling but promised that her left-wing political movement would “return, as always”.

But historian Sergio Berensztein told AFP he believed the calls for her release would be short-lived and have limited effect.

“She is not the Cristina of 2019,” he said.

Argentina’s Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the six-year prison sentence for former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner over irregularities in public works contracts during her time in office.

The country’s highest court rejected an appeal filed by Fernandez’s legal team against lower-court rulings, confirming both the prison term and her lifetime ban from holding public office.

The ruling stemmed from the so-called “Vialidad case,” which investigated the awarding of 51 road construction contracts in the southern province of Santa Cruz to companies owned by businessman Lazaro Baez during the administrations of Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007) and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner (2007-2015), the widow of Nestor Kirchner.

Fernandez has repeatedly denied wrongdoing and described the legal proceedings as politically motivated persecution.

Source: Xinhua

–Agencies

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Argentina’s former president and one of the country’s most polarising political figures, has been sentenced to prison and barred for life from public office after the Supreme Court upheld her corruption conviction.

The ruling is likely to deepen political tensions in the country and comes after Ms Fernández, who was the target of an assassination attempt three years ago, announced plans for a political comeback.

Supporters blocked key highways around the capital, Buenos Aires, before the court decision against the left-leaning Ms Fernández, who has clashed repeatedly with Argentina’s right-wing president, Javier Milei, while major labour unions had threatened national strikes.

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal by Ms Fernández in a 27-page ruling, cementing a six-year sentence handed down by a lower court that had found she defrauded the state during her two terms as president, from 2007 to 2015.

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Ms Fernández (72), is unlikely to serve significant prison time as Argentine law often allows house arrest for those over age 70.

The lower court, which will determine if she gets home detention, said she had five business days to present herself before the tribunal to be officially detained.

The former president could be held behind bars at a police station for a few days until a judge approves her home detention, said Andrés Gil Domínguez, a constitutional law professor at the University of Buenos Aires.

Ms Fernández told supporters outside her party’s headquarters shortly after the court ruling, “This Argentina we’re living in today never ceases to surprise us.”

She called the three members of the Supreme Court “puppets” and characterised them as “a “triumvirate of disgraceful figures” who answered to powerful economic interests, and said they were now “imposing a clamp on the popular vote.”

As for Mr Milei, he wrote, “Justice” on the social platform X and reposted several messages that celebrated the ruling.

A fixture in Argentine politics for more than three decades, Ms Fernández remains a divisive figure. While much of the country views her presidency as synonymous with economic mismanagement and corruption, she continues to command a loyal base that credits her with expansive social programmes.

Ms Fernández, who was also vice president from 2019 to 2023, has faced numerous charges of corruption. She was convicted in 2022 of steering public roadworks contracts in a southern province to a family friend and business associate.

She has rejected the charges as politically motivated, accusing opponents of weaponising the judiciary to curb her influence.

The court determined that the scheme had began under her husband and predecessor, Néstor Kirchner, and continued during her two presidential terms. He had been governor of southern Santa Cruz province and served as president from 2003 to 2007. He died in 2010.

Since 2024, she has led the Justicialist Party, the main opposition force to Mr Milei and the largest political platform for Peronism, the populist, nationalist movement that has shaped much of Argentina’s modern political history.

Mr Milei has frequently blamed Ms Fernández, as well as her husband, for years of economic mismanagement and systemic corruption that sent the country into a downward economic spiral. Mr Milei won office in 2023 by vowing to slash public spending and overhaul Argentina’s state-heavy economy.

Ms Fernández recently announced that she was running for a seat in the Buenos Aires provincial legislature in elections this year. She would have been a heavy favorite, and a victory would have granted her immunity from serving the sentence.

“Coincidence is not a political category,” she told supporters as she prepared for the decision from Argentina’s highest court. “It only took us announcing a candidacy a week ago for the demons to be unleashed.”

She characterised efforts to imprison her as a way to quiet her criticism of Mr Milei’s right-wing economic policies, which have included broad austerity measures.

“Go ahead, throw me in prison,” she said. “Do you really believe this will fix anything? I might be behind bars, but people will be worse off by the day.”

During her trial in 2022, supporters gathered outside her Buenos Aires apartment every day to show solidarity.

In September of that year, a man at the entrance to her building pointed a loaded pistol at her head at close range. The weapon jammed and she was uninjured. The accused gunman and two others are facing trial.

The former president faces several other legal issues, including accusations of money laundering, orchestrating a corruption scheme involving public works and conspiring with Iran to cover up its suspected role in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people. – The New York Times.

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