Former Argentine Foreign Minister Hector Timerman dies

Buenos Aires — Former Argentine Foreign Minister Hector Timerman, who served in that post from 2010-2015 during the government of Cristina Fernandez, died Sunday from cancer of the liver, from which he had suffered for several years, his brother Javier confirmed in a post on one of the social networks. He was 65.

“My darling brother. Thanks for everything you did for me. I admire you greatly. I’m going to miss you more than you can imagine,” wrote Javier Timerman on Twitter on Sunday morning.

Besides serving as Foreign Relations and Culture minister for five years, Timerman was also Argentina’s ambassador to the US from 2008-2010, but for a large part of his professional career he worked as a journalist, a profession his father, Jacobo Timerman, the founder of Argentine daily La Opinion, also pursued.

Timerman testified by videoconference last July as part of the investigation of the alleged cover-up of the 1994 AMIA Argentine Jewish mutual association bombing in Buenos Aires that killed 85 and the perpetrators of which remain at large.

In his testimony, the former foreign minister said he was innocent, adding that the trial was proceeding quite slowly, something he attributed to the interests of countries such as the US and Israel.

Because of his delicate health, Timerman had been serving since December 2017 a term of precautionary house arrest while he was being tried for his potential responsibility in the attack, but later he was allowed for “humanitarian reasons” to travel to the US to receive medical treatment for his cancer.

A few days before prosecutor Alberto Nisman was found dead in Jaunary 2015 under circumstances that are still being investigated, Nisman had denounced then-President Fernandez and officials, including Timerman, for holding illegal negotiations with Iran to foster trade with that country.

In exchange, the South American country allegedly rescinded the capture red alerts on Iranians indicted in Argentina for the AMIA attack, including former Iranian government ministers.