Buenos Aires, 19 January 2015

The Wiesenthal Center is deeply saddened and shocked by the tragic death of Argentine Special Prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who was found dead in his apartment this morning, with a gunshot wound to his head.

Prosecutor Nisman, who was in charge of the investigation of the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish Center, was scheduled to testify in Congress today, to offer details about the accusations he made last week against Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, Foreign Minister Héctor Timerman, members of the Congress and radical activists who are close to the government of having organized a cover-up operation that would disengage the Iranian suspects from the AMIA terror attack.

Nisman’s tragic death put us further away than ever before from truth and justice, both in the AMIA attack itself as well as in his last denunciation.

Today’s deadly outcome must not hide a core question: his denunciation regarding an alleged cover up by the Argentine government must be investigated till the end.

There is a new course of investigation: beyond the AMIA bombing and the accusations of covering up, we demand an independent investigation about the circumstances around Prosecutor Nisman’s death.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center urges the Argentine authorities to preserve all the material gathered by Prosecutor Nisman and to guarantee the security of all the members of Nisman’s staff.

We express our condolences to the family of Prosecutor Alberto Nisman.

We reaffirm our solidarity with the families of the 85 victims of the AMIA bombing.

Since 1994, and throughout all of its administrations, Argentina holds a debt with the democratic world which is under terrorist fire, with the victims of terror all over the world, with the Argentine society and, particularly, with the families of the 85 victims of the AMIA massacre: 20 years after the bombing no person is in prison.

Our mentor, the late Simon Wiesenthal, said: “Freedom is not a gift from heaven; one must fight for it every day”.

We must also fight for truth and justice. And we will.