A federal judge in Buenos Aires froze the assets of former Argentinian president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner [BBC profile] Wednesday. The action comes [BBC report] in association with the charge against de Kirchner for fraudulently manipulating the economy during her final months in office. Kirchner is charged with conspiring to sell USD $17 billion in futures contracts using an inflated dollar value for the country’s own currency. Kirchner’s crimes may be punishable by fiveto 20 years in prison. The judge, Claudio Bonadio, is a staunch opponent of Kirchner, and Kirchner claims that the charges against her are politically motivated [JURIST report].

Kirchner has recently been the subject of various corruption investigations. In May an Argentinian federal prosecutor made a formal request [JURIST report] to a judge to conduct an investigation of Kirchner and her son for illegal enrichment in an ongoing money laundering investigation. Last year a judge in Argentina dismissed criminal allegations against Kirchner that accused her of conspiring to shield Iranian officials from responsibility for the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires. Kirchner was accused [JURIST report] of the cover up in January 2015. An appeals court in Argentina ruled in May 2014 that a controversial agreement between Argentina and Iran to investigate the 1994 bombing was unconstitutional [JURIST report]. The two nations signed [JURIST report] the agreement in January 2013, which permitted Argentinian authorities to question the Iranian suspects under Interpol arrest warrants, but only in Tehran. In 2005 Argentina accepted [JURIST report] formal responsibility for its failure to discover who was behind the 1994 bombing.