Argentine President Cristina Kirchner was formally accused Friday of shielding Iranian officials from prosecution over a 1994 bombing at a Buenos Aires Jewish center, prosecutors said, according to AFP.

The prosecution move advances the case against Kirchner that was being pursued by late prosecutor Alberto Nisman before he died mysteriously on the eve of congressional hearings on his accusations.

The accusation now goes to the judge in the case, Daniel Rafecas, to decide whether to call Kirchner to make a statement.

Kirchner has been under fire since Nisman turned up dead after accusing her of covering up the involvement of high-ranking Iranian officials in the deadly bombing in exchange for oil.

It has since been revealed that Nisman had drafted arrest warrants for Kirchner and for Foreign Minister Hector Timerman before he was found dead.

The new prosecutor in the case, Gerardo Pollicita, accepted Nisman’s conclusions and accused Kirchner, Timerman and other government officials of mounting a cover-up and violating their duties, according to a prosecution statement cited by AFP.

Nisman, 51, was found in his Buenos Aires apartment with a gunshot wound to the head on January 18.

His death was initially labeled a suicide, but suspicion has fallen on Kirchner’s government.

The president has suggested Nisman was manipulated by disgruntled former intelligence agents who then killed him to smear her.

Earlier on Friday, Kirchner’s cabinet chief accused the courts of trying to stage a “judicial coup” by pursuing Nisman’s case against the president.

The decision to pursue the investigation, plus a prosecutors’ march next Wednesday to mark one month since Nisman’s death, amount to “a strategy to actively stage a judicial coup, seeking to cause social unrest,” said cabinet chief Jorge Capitanich.

He compared Kirchner’s recent political woes to those facing other world leaders.

“The struggle in this world is between democracy and obscure groups linked to powerful economic interests. Barack Obama is facing an onslaught by the recalcitrant Republican right. In Brazil, Dilma Rousseff is suffering an attack with calls for impeachment,” he said, according to AFP.

(Arutz Sheva’s North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Arutz Sheva articles, however, is Israeli time.)