Argentines rally for convicted ex-president

Tens of thousands take to the streets

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Tens of thousands of Argentines took to the streets Wednesday in support of former president Cristina Kirchner, who vowed to make a comeback as she serves a six-year fraud sentence under house arrest.

In a recorded speech played for supporters amassed on Buenos Aires’s Plaza de Mayo square, Kirchner said: “We will be back with more wisdom, more unity, more strength.”

Backers of the polarising leftist massed on the square and spilled into surrounding streets for a demonstration called by the 72-year-old’s Justicialist Party.

Under the slogan “Argentina with Cristina,” protesters sang and beat drums, waving national flags and banners with messages such as “The motherland is not for sale.”

“We came because it's an attack on democracy to outlaw someone like Cristina who the people want to vote for,” Rocio Gavino, a 29-year-old public employee, told AFP.