Former Argentine president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who has been under house arrest since 2025, announced on Wednesday that she will take her case to the United Nations Human Rights Committee, alleging violations of her fundamental rights in the proceedings that led to her conviction in the Vialidad corruption case.
Kirchner, who will not be able to compete in the next presidential elections in 2027, made the announcement in an open letter, arguing that her conviction was an “instrument of political persecution and proscription.”
“Lifetime proscription is, in fact, the main sentence. The six-year prison term is merely an additional penalty,” she wrote, accusing the judiciary of “structural sexism” and linking what she described as “judicial persecution” to the 2022 assassination attempt against her.
Kirchner said her petition to the UN body will be backed by Spanish legal expert Javier Borrego and Brazilian jurist Rafael Valim.
The goal is for the UN Human Rights Committee to review her case and determine whether the judges who presided over her trial violated international human rights standards.
