GLACIERS LAW REFORM
The Chamber of Deputies passed amendments of the 2010 Glaciers Law in the small hours of Thursday by a 137- 111 vote with three abstentions after a session of over 11 hours. President Javier Milei celebrated the result as “a triumph of true environmental federalism and a smart sovereign policy for exploiting our resources” while removing the last obstacles to mining by “permitting the exploitation of minerals in terrain falsely catalogued as glaciers,” alleging that “the original text was confusing and led to absurd interpretations prohibiting mining in general” and also attributing the previous barriers to the “interference of foreign organisations and ecologists bent on impeding the progress of the Argentine Republic.” Seven Greenpeace activists protesting the legislation outside Congress were arrested on Wednesday morning before the session began after scaling a statue and putting up banners.
MOSCOW DOES NOT BELIEVE IN FAKES
Just before last weekend the Russian Embassy vehemently rejected the findings of recent investigations pointing to the presumed existence of a Moscow-funded disinformation operation in this country. These investigations, the work of an international consortium of journalists headed locally by Santiago O’Donnell (who began his career at the Buenos Aires Herald), have dug up a propaganda network known as “The Company,” linked to intelligence services and active in regions like Latin America and Africa, which had orchestrated a systematic campaign in the second half of 2024 to undermine the image of the Javier Milei presidency, spending an alleged US$283,000 on the publication of over 250 articles in diverse digital media criticising economic austerity and questioning the Casa Rosada’s pro-Western alignment (not all articles were published, some bylined to fake writers who were generated by AI). Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno responded to the Russian Embassy by telling them that the investigations would go ahead while President Milei insisted: “We do not hate journalists enough” even though the smears against him had been exposed by journalists. Senator Patricia Bullrich (La Libertad Avanza-City) immediately ordered the investigation into the fake news produced by Russian espionage to be expanded while the media carrying the questioned articles were subsequently denied access to the Casa Rosada as from Monday in what government sources called a “preventive” measure.
ADORNI SEEKS COUNSEL
Following the advice of former Justice Minister Mariano Cúneo Libarona to find a lawyer, embattled Cabinet Chief Manuel Adorni designated as his defence lawyer Matías Ledesma, the son of former Junta Trial judge Guillermo Ledesma who has in the past defended the late courier tycoon Alfredo Yabrán (accused of killing Noticias photographer José Luis Cabezas in 1997). Already under fire over trips to New York and Punta del Este along with the dubious acquisition of various properties, reports of an exclusive trip to Aruba with Adorni staying at a resort charging the equivalent of a million pesos daily have now come to the attention of the courts. Last Wednesday Adorni’s notary Adriana Nechevenko was summoned to court to testify on the purchase of his Caballito flat. Despite his legal tribulations Adorni remained active as Cabinet chief last week, including an announcement that a bill to update mental health legislation would be submitted to Congress.
MORTGAGE SCANDALS
Just before last weekend Human Capital Minister Sandra Pettovello ordered her Cabinet chief Leandro Massaccesi (the son of former two-term Río Negro governor and 1995 Radical presidential candidate Horacio Massaccesi) to resign on the grounds of having abused his position to take out a Banco Nación mortgage to the tune of 420 million pesos. While Massaccesi was not accused of any crime or irregularity (as the departing official was at pains to state), his action was repudiated for clashing directly with the government’s austerity policies, for which there was "zero tolerance." Massacessi’s exit does not end the scandal – last Monday three more charges of government officials abusing their position to obtain preferential Banco Nación mortgages went before federal judge Ariel Lijo, considered the tip of the iceberg for dozens of government officials and parliamentarians being the beneficiaries of mortgages of up to half a billion pesos.
IRANIAN ENVOY SHOWN DOOR
Iranian chargé d’affaires Mohsen Soltani Tehrani (whose surname echoes his country’s capital) left Argentina last Monday, thus ending five years of representing the Islamic Republic, after being declared "persona non grata” by the government and given 48 hours to leave the country, Quirno confirmed via his social networks. The government took umbrage over Iran’s “offensive” reactions to its Republican Guard being registered as a terrorist organisation by the Milei administration firmly aligned with the United States and Israel.
WORLD BANK BULLISH
The World Bank on Wednesday projected economic growth of 3.6 percent in Argentina for this year, well above the regional average of 2.1 percent, with 3.7 percent growth for 2027 while warning against the costs and distortions of the industrial promotion scheme in Tierra del Fuego, now extended until 2038. Net negative Central Bank reserves were another concern. The pickup in growth was thanks to economic policies centred on fiscal surplus, the World Bank concluded, also hailing the fall of country risk from 2,200 points to under 600 since 2023.
LOMA NEGRA REPATRIATED
Loma Negra, whose nine plants have dominated the country’s cement market for the past century, returned into Argentine hands after over two decades last Monday when the businessman Marcelo Mindlin bought it back against a payment of US$110 million from its previous São Paulo owners of Brazil’s InterCemento, whose debts top US$2 billion. New York ( Redwood Capital Management) and Chilean capital is also involved.
MOON MISSION
The Argentine microsatellite ATENEA attached to the Artemis II moon mission successfully completed its 20 hours of transmitting data from outer space to earth last weekend, the CONAE (Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales) space agency informed. Stations in Córdoba and Tierra del Fuego were among the recipients of data transmitted from over 40,000 kilometres away. Meanwhile, the crew circling the Moon released fantastic images taken up in outer space during their record-breaking journey.
BABYSNATCHING PROBES ABROAD BLOCKED
According to the EFE news agency, the Milei government has effectively paralysed the identification of those forcibly adopted after being born during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship by cutting off the sending of the corresponding DNA testing kits to consulates abroad.
DOUBLE WHAMMY FOR BUSES
Sharply rising fuel prices from the Middle East crisis plus a pay conflict from delays in remitting the funds to pay wages led to both bus companies and their drivers favouring a reduction of frequencies of around 30 percent last Thursday, inconveniencing thousands of passengers. Meanwhile there were meetings at the Transport Secretariat to discuss higher fuel subsidies. There were also fewer buses on Tuesday and Wednesday.
MALVINAS, NOT FALKLANDS, FOR NEIGHBOURS
Following Veterans Day last April 2 marking the 44th anniversary of the outbreak of the 1982 South Atlantic war, the Bolivian Foreign Ministry endorsed Argentine sovereignty claims over the Malvinas, prompting a protest from British Ambassador to La Paz Richard Porter. In Argentina the occasion featured a rally attended by President Milei, who gave a speech reaffirming Argentine sovereignty over the Malvinas while underlining the importance of boosting the Armed Forces to that end and blasting Kirchnerite corruption as undermining the country’s image for recovering the islands. Milei’s speech also pinpointed oil exploration in the South Atlantic. Vice-President Victoria Villarruel attended a separate tribute to war veterans in Chivilcoy. Last Monday the new Chilean President José Antonio Kast also backed Argentina’s sovereign rights while meeting with Milei in this city.
MELCONIAN THINKS BIG
President Milei could have a rival from within the profession in next year’s election – last Wednesday economist Carlos Melconian spoke of a possible run, remarking: "You have to know what needs to be done " while accusing President Milei of "contaminating and prostituting" Western capitalism. Charging that a fiscal surplus does not feed, cure or educate anybody, Melconian also pledged to translate into reality various things which Milei had promised but failed to carry out, such as closing down the Central Bank, the “chainsaw” and destroying the “caste” while also privatising Banco Nación. Melconian was 2023 Juntos por el Cambio presidential candidate Patricia Bullrich’s pick to become Economy Minister had she won. Meanwhile a rather more established presidential hopeful, Buenos Aires Province Governor Axel Kicillof, took a further step towards his candidacy by launching his Movimiento Derecho al Futuro movement in UBA Buenos Aires University last Thursday.
BOOK PRIZE
Argentine writer Samanta Schweblin, 48 and currently resident in Berlin, last Wednesday won the Aena Prize for Spanish-language literature, worth a million euros, for her book El buen mal. Rosa Montero, president of the jury, said Schweblin traced “the frontiers between the possible and impossible with hypnotic beauty.” A nervous winner thanked her family and the “very abandoned” University of Buenos Aires for giving her the passion for reading, helping her to win the prize.
THREE WORLD CUP REFS
For the first time in history there will be three Argentine referees at this year’s expanded World Cup: Yael Falcón Pérez, Facundo Tello (who was already in Qatar in 2022) and Darío Herrera. Five more Argentines will be linesmen. Just before the tournament begins, the national team will have warm-up friendlies against Honduras in Alabama on June 6 and Iceland on June 9 in Alabama.
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