Weekly Report - 20 April 2004

As congress rushed to toughen legislation in response to public outrage over the recent Blumberg kidnapping (WR-04-14), and a new security minister in the province of Buenos Aires unveiled yet another plan to purge its police force of criminal elements, investigators delivered a highly embarrassing shock to the government. They found evidence of collusion in the Blumberg abduction, not of the provincial force but of the federal police - right up to the recently appointed chief of the new antikidnap division.