The head of the Federal Intelligence Agency (AFI), Agustín Rossi, questioned this Friday the dismissal that the Buenos Aires Federal Chamber granted to former president Mauricio Macri in the case of illegal wiretapping of relatives of ARA San Juan, considering that since they could not “denying that espionage had been carried out” the magistrates of that court relied on “national security” to disassociate the former president.
“It was very evident that they could not deny that espionage had been carried out. They brought this action within the legality, hiding behind what national security means,” said the former Defense Minister. in statements to El Destape Radio.
Rossi assessed that the ruling “encompasses” the intelligence tasks carried out by the AFI in “a matter of security for the President of the Nation” to rule for the benefit of Macri.
“It is impossible to believe that this group of family members, who were highly vulnerable from a psychological point of view, could threaten presidential security,” the official said when questioning the basis of the Buenos Aires Federal Chamber.
Along the same lines, he continued: “They spied on a 30-year-old woman with two small children crying for the loss of their father.”
“They spied on a 30-year-old woman with two small children crying for the loss of her father”
The former Minister of Defense evaluated that these types of situations were considered “causal” for these espionage procedures, since they could generate “some type of grievance” for presidential security.
In addition, he warned about the possibility that “the issue of presidential security custody” could generate an “excuse” that “enables espionage on other groups.”
Meanwhile, he stated that “Macri’s responsibility” in the case of illegal espionage “was indubitable.”
“Macri is not only directly politically and institutionally responsible for the AFI, but the information that was produced from illegal espionage was used by Macri for meetings with relatives of ARA San Juan,” he added.
“Of the causes that were raised at the time, the only one that is still in force is the cause of the Macrista Gestapo, which has not yet reached Comodoro Py”
Asked about the strategies to avoid this type of maneuvers, he expressed that “for this not to happen again Cambiemos does not have to win”, since, he warned, that in the previous government they worked “with more predisposition to espionage tasks” in the AFI.
“Not for nothing Macri when he assumed (the presidency) in 2015 had to be dismissed because he was accused of illegal espionage that he had done when he was Head of Government of the City of Buenos Aires,” he recalled.
In addition, he referred to the other ruling of the Federal Chamber today in which the prosecutions that weighed on the macrista officials in charge of the AFI in the management of Cambiemos, Gustavo Arribas and Silvia Majdalani, were revoked for alleged espionage maneuvers. politician from the so-called AMBA bases.
“Of the causes that were raised at the time, the only one that is still in force is the cause of the macrista Gestapo, which has not yet reached Comodoro Py,” he assessed.
Finally, before the celebration of the ex-governor of the province of Buenos Aires, María Eugenia Vidal, and the current Head of Government of Buenos Aires, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, for the dismissal of Macri, who was also denounced for having spied on both of them, considered that that “demonstrates the leadership” that the former president has in Together for Change (JxC).
