Report: Argentine President Kirchner charged for alleged cover-up of 1994 bombing

Argentine president Crisitina Fernández de Kirchner is being investigated over an alleged cover-up of Iran's role in the 1994 bombing in Buenos Aires, the Buenos Aires Herald reports.

Federal Prosecutor Gerardo Pollicita has requested to investigate President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman in a case involving an alleged cover-up of Iran's role in the 1994 AMIA bombing.

The news was first reported by Clarin.

"Giving a green light to a complaint first filed by now later AMIA special prosecutor Alberto Nisman, Pollicita presented the report before Judge Daniel Rafefas," the paper reports.

Nisman was found dead in his apartment after investigating the terrorist attack. He wanted Kirchner arrested for covering up for the perpetrators.

In a report detailing the findings of his investigation, Nisman said that Kirchner and Timerman protected the bombers, who were allegedly financed by Iran. They did so, said Nisman, to secure a deal - a food-for-oil exchange between Argentina and Iran.

Last month, the New York Times reported that intercepted conversations between Argentine and Iranian officials "point to a long pattern of secret negotiations to reach a deal in which Argentina would receive oil in exchange for shielding Iranian officials" from being formally accused of orchestrating the terror attack.

The conversations were part of a 289-page criminal complaint written by Nisman and made public by an Argentine judge on Tuesday night.

If genuine, The Times notes, the transcripts show "a concerted effort by representatives of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner's government to shift suspicions away from Iran in order to gain access to Iranian markets and to ease Argentina's energy troubles."

After a decade of work, Nisman concluded that Iran's government planned and executed the 1994 car-bomb attack on the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA), in which 85 people were killed.

Nisman's death was tentatively being considered as a suicide, with the jurist felled by a single bullet wound to the head and clutching the gun that killed him. But there are indications that it was something much more sinister.

The lack of an exit wound suggested the fatal shot was fired at a further distance than Nisman could have managed had the wound been self-inflicted. His last WhatsApp message was a photo of stacks of documentation related to the next day's testimony, and Nisman had apparently given his maid a grocery list for the following week.

A 10-person government security detail was reportedly pulled off of his apartment the night of his death. Most damningly, there was no gunpowder residue found on Nisman's hands, physical evidence that he didn't discharge a firearm prior to his death.

More to come.