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By Leila Miller
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) -Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, Argentina’s leading opposition leader and a two-time former president, has petitioned a lower court to allow her to serve a sentence for corruption under house arrest, citing how several years ago she narrowly survived an assassination attempt.
The petition, which Kirchner shared on X on Friday, said that for security reasons she should be allowed to serve her six-year sentence at her home in Buenos Aires. She described the threat she might face as a former president and how during the corruption trial in 2022, she was the target of an assassination attempt that failed when the gunman’s pistol, inches from her head, did not fire.
"This is not about a privilege," she wrote on X. "On the contrary, it follows strict reasons of personal security."
Kirchner, 72, is also entitled to ask the court for house arrest because of her age.
The criminal court is expected to rule on her petition in the coming days. Kirchner said on X that she would appear in court on Wednesday.
Argentina’s Supreme Court earlier this week upheld a six-year sentence that found Kirchner guilty of fraud and banned her from holding public office. Kirchner, who had announced plans earlier this month to run in Buenos Aires’ legislative elections, has called the decision politically motivated and the three Supreme Court judges "puppets."
The sentence has galvanized a show of support among Kirchner’s Peronist movement, which had suffered from internal factions and disillusionment. Since the decision, large protests have taken place in downtown Buenos Aires and cut off local highways.