Cristina Fernández de Kirchner claims police are attempting to provoke supporters

Former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner urged supporters Friday not to gather outside her apartment in Buenos Aires, where she is serving a six-year prison sentence, saying she feared police violence.

Fernández de Kirchner, 72,  alleged on social media the government had "orchestrated a police operation at the door of my house with the sole purpose of provoking conflicts." 

She called on her backers, who have held a days-long vigil outside her flat, to exercise "wisdom and restraint" and to move a planned demonstration at the location on Friday to a nearby square.

Police barriers were put up close to the building that houses her aparment on Friday, with several police trucks stationed nearby. 

After the request, hundreds of demonstrators carrying Argentine flags to mark a national holiday gathered in Parque Lezama, where a recorded message from the ex-president was broadcast.

“This model is unsustainable, sooner or later it will fall ... they may send police, but people want to eat and have a future,” said Fernández de Kirchner, who is seen as the main opposition leader to President Javier Milei’s government.

She also said that Milei’s “chainsaw” austerity approach was false, denouncing the claim that the government had recorded a fiscal surplus.

“If they defund science, health, education and do not build any public works, anyone has a surplus,” she argued.

Fernández de Kirchner also noted an increase in unemployment, which in the first quarter of this year grew to 7.9 percent, against 7.7 percent in the same period of 2024.

Fernández de Kirchner, who was convicted of "fraudulent administration" over public works contracts awarded during her 2007-2015 two-term presidency, had a final appeal overturned by the Supreme Court last week. 

The court upheld her sentence and a lifetime ban on holding public office. 

A different judge allowed Fernández de Kirchner to serve her sentence at home, which quickly became the scene of demonstrations by her supporters.

On Wednesday, tens of thousands of people marched to the Plaza de Mayo square by the Casa Rosada, gathering under the banner "Argentina with Cristina." 

The following day, a judge ruled Fernández de Kirchner may use her second-floor balcony, under which supporters had been keeping vigil and where she made several brief public appearances.

A ban on "any behaviour that could disturb the peace of the neighbourhood" had led to fears she could be confined indoors. 

Fernández de Kirchner has challenged limited visitation rights ordered by the court, restricted to family members, doctors and lawyers in what her team described as "a totally arbitrary exclusion regime." 

There has been speculation Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva could try and visit her when he travels to Buenos Aires for a summit in July. 

He would have to request permission from the courts to visit her. 

– TIMES/AFP