An Argentine federal court handed down life sentences on Dec. 19 to former Buenos Aires province interior minister Jaime Smart (1976-1979), former Buenos Aires province police investigations director Miguel Osvaldo Etchecolatz and 14 former police and military personnel for genocide and crimes against humanity in the cases of 280 people detained during the 1976-1983 "dirty war" against suspected leftists. Another seven police agents and civilians were given sentences of two to 25 years.

A wave of store lootings, the first in Argentina since 2001, started on Dec. 20 when people with covered faces broke into six supermarkets in San Carlos de Bariloche, in the southwestern province of Río Negro. At the request of local authorities, the center-left government of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner sent 400 members of the Gendarmería militarized police to the city, which is best known as an Andean ski resort popular during the Southern Hemisphere's winter. The national government blamed small criminal gangs, while local authorities said anarchist groups were responsible.

On Dec. 5 Argentine judge Alicia Vence opened an investigation into the possible involvement of four former executives of Ford Motor Company's Argentine subsidiary in the kidnapping and torture of at least 25 autoworkers during the "dirty war" against suspected leftists under the 1976-83 military dictatorship. According to prosecutor Félix Crous, former Ford Motor Argentina president Nicolás Courard, former manufacturing director Pedro Müller, former industrial relations director Guillermo Galarraga and former security chief Héctor Sibilla are suspected of collaborating with the military in the abuses, which took place in 1976 next to the company's plant in the city of General Pacheco in Buenos Aires province, just north of the city of Buenos Aires.

According to Argentine environmentalist groups, dozens of opponents of large-scale mining projects were injured when hundreds of construction workers attacked them at the provincial legislature building in Rawson, the administrative capital of the southern province of Chubut, on the late afternoon of Nov. 27. At a press conference held the next day in the offices of the Chubut Education Workers Association (ATECH), local activists charged that the attack had been carried out by members of the Workers Union of Construction of the Argentine Republic Union (UOCRA) contracted by Chubut governor Martín Buzzi, of the Justicialist Party (PJ, Peronist), and federal legislative deputy Carlos Eliceche. UOCRA general secretary Gerardo Martínez is said to have worked as a secret agent at the Campo de Mayo military base during the 1976-1983 dictatorship.

Argentina's largest union federation, the General Confederation of Labor (CGT), and the more radical Federation of Argentine Workers (CTA) sponsored a nationwide general strike on Nov. 20 to protest President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner's economic policies. The majority of the country's unions supported the strike call, as did leftist parties and the leftist Classist and Combative Current (CCC), but the CGT section led by Antonio Caló, representing 33 industrial and service unions, ignored the strike call. Organizers called the action a success, while President Fernández dismissed it as "a phenomenon limited to some service unions and to the area around the federal capital."

In a Nov. 17 statement the leaders of the Southern Common Market (Mercosur), a trade bloc made up of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay (suspended), Uruguay and Venezuela, expressed their "strongest condemnation of the violence unleashed between Israel and Palestine" and their "concern with the disproportionate use of force" since Israel began a military offensive against Gaza on Nov. 14. Mercosur also expressed "its support to the request from the state of Palestine to obtain the status of [United Nations] observer member."

The Economic and Finance Minister of Argentina, Hernán Lorenzino, held a press conference Nov. 22 indicating Argentina's intent to appeal a US judge's ruling ordering it to pay $1.33 billion to bondholders. District Judge Thomas Griesa for the US District Court for the Southern District of New York in his decision stated that "Argentina must pay the debts it owes." Lorenzino, in response to the ruling, stated during the press conference that the ruling was unfair and that Argentina will seek any and all methods to protect the country's interest. In addition, Lorenzino indicated that Argentina will appeal the ruling to the US Supreme Court if necessary and is willing to resort to any international body available.

Hundreds of thousands of indignados—"indignant ones," as econo-protesters call themselves in Spain and Argentina—filled the streets of Buenos Aires and other cities in the South American country Nov. 8 to protest the government of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. The main focal point was the capital's iconic Obelisk Plaza, which was occupied by multitudes beating on pots and pans (cacerlazo), and chanting "We are not afraid!" Protesters opposed rising prices, corruption, and a proposed constitutional reform many fear will allow Fernández to hold onto power indefinitely by ending term limits. By popular consensus, the only banner at the protests was the national flag—to emphasize that it was an action of Argentines and not political parties.