CHILE'S SUPREME COURT EXTRADITES PERU'S EX-PRESIDENT ALBERTO FUJIMORI TO FACE CHARGES IN PERU.
On Sept. 21, Chile's highest court ordered that former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) be returned to Peru to face human rights abuse and corruption charges. The ruling by Chile's Corte Suprema de Justicia (CSJ) reversed a prior decision by Federal Judge Orlando Alvarez, who denied Peru's request for Fujimori's extradition in July and claimed there was insufficient evidence against him (see NotiSur, 2007-07-27). Shortly after the CSJ's decision, Chilean authorities transported the 69-year-old Fujimori to the Peruvian border, where police from his home country took him into custody.
Fujimori handed over at border
Fujimori will now face several charges in Peru, although it will reportedly take months for prosecutors to ready their cases against him. Among the charges are two human rights accusations for sanctioning death squad killings, with 15 killed in Barrios Altos in 1991 and 10 killed in La Cantuta in 1992 (see NotiSur, 2005-11-18). The BBC reports that there are also five corruption charges against Fujimori for allegedly embezzling US$15 million, making payoffs to members of Congress, and illegal wiretapping.
Fujimori's former intelligence chief, Vladimiro Montesinos, has lost multiple trials for similar crimes and is incarcerated at the naval prison in El Callao (see NotiSur, 2004-01-30 and 2006-10-06). The two fell from power in 2000 after a video emerged showing Montesinos bribing an opposition legislator and other allegations cast a pall on the administration (see NotiSur, 2000-09-22).
CSJ justices agreed to extradite Fujimori on seven of 13 charges submitted by Peru, including abuse of public funds and murder. The court ruled extradition was warranted in cases that included the killings of 15 people at a downtown Lima barbecue in 1991 and the deaths and disappearance of nine university students and a professor at Lima's La Universidad Nacional de Educacion Enrique Guzman y Valle, know as La Cantuta, in 1992.
The ex-president would not try to contest the ruling, said Gabriel Zaliasnik, Fujimori's lawyer in Chile when the decision was announced. "He will immediately submit to the process and is awaiting the procedure to transfer him to Peru," Zaliasnik said in televised comments. "He's very calm and is disposed to face the Peruvian judiciary."
The move may yet bring protests by supporters of Fujimori, who remains popular among a significant segment of the working-class Peruvian electorate. But the street turnout during his return did even not reach the 1,000-person mark, according to press reports.
Fujimori could be sentenced within two months after the first of seven pending trials concludes, Justice Francisco Tavara of Peru's Corte Suprema de Justicia (CSJ) told Lima-based Radio Programas. The CSJ's division that handles criminal cases will conduct the trial, Fujimori's lawyer Cesar Nakazaki told...
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