Chile extradites former president of Peru

Former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori must be extradited to Peru to face trial on corruption and human rights charges, Chile’s Supreme Court ruled on Friday in a decision that cannot be appealed.

Justice Alberto Chaigneau said it “was much easier than expected” for the court’s criminal panel to approve the Peruvian request for extradition on two human rights charges and five corruption charges stemming from Fujimori’s 1990-2000 rule. Chaigneau said six of the 13 charges for which Peru had requested extradition were denied.

Chile plans to extradite the 69-year-old former ruler to Peru as soon as possible.

Human Rights Watch said it was the first time a court anywhere in the world had ordered the extradition of a former leader to be tried in his home country for human rights violations.

“After years of evading justice, Fujimori will finally have to respond to the charges and evidence against him in the country he used to run like a mafia boss,” said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for the Washington-based rights group.

Fujimori has repeatedly denied the charges, calling them politically motivated. But his Chilean lawyer, Gabriel Zaliasnik, said Fujimori would accept the decision.

“We are not planning to seek any delays or attempt any kind of manoeuvres,” Zaliasnik said.

Fujimori was highly popular in the early years of his administration, largely crushing a violent guerrilla movement and overseeing a flourishing economy. But an increasing drift towards authoritarianism and evidence of corruption eventually turned many Peruvians against him.

Still, he retains many followers in Peru, where his daughter Keiko was elected to Congress last year.

According to their extradition treaty, Chile now has three months to send Fujimori back. But there could be a delay while Peru prepares a prison facility for him.

When Fujimori’s former spy chief, Vladimiro Montesinos, was grabbed in Venezuela in June 2001, he was sent back within days and jailed in a high-security naval prison where Abimael Guzman and other top leaders of the Shining Path rebel movement were being held.

But as a political figure and a former head of state, Fujimori will apparently be held in a special facility inside a regular prison pending his trial, which could easily last more than a year. Montesinos has been on trial for six years on multiple charges.

The human rights cases against Fujimori include the 1993 death-squad slayings of nine students and a professor at La Cantuta University, and the 1991 killings of 15 people at Barrios Altos, a working-class neighbourhood of Lima. The corruption charges involve alleged pay-offs to politicians and to news media, illegal phone tapping and misuse of £7.5 million in government funds.