Corruption, Law & Justice, Lima, Politics

Alan García Seeks Asylum in Uruguayan Embassy

Former President Alan Garcia arrives at the court in downtown Lima for questioning on Odebrecht corruption allegations. Source: Andina

Former President Alan Garcia sought asylum in the Uruguayan Embassy at dawn on Sunday, hours after he was slapped with an 18-month travel ban in the investigation into bribes and money laundering related to the Brazilian construction firm Odebrecht.

García, who lives most of the year in Madrid, arrived in Lima Thursday to answer questions from district attorney Jose Domingo Perez, who leads the money laundering investigations in the Odebrecht cases.  He had previously been questioned in October and June this year.  However, the session on Thursday was suspended shortly after it began, to be resumed this week, and the district attorney’s office requested a travel ban on the grounds that Garcia posed a flight risk.

The travel ban was approved Saturday by the second court in anti-corruption investigations.

Garcia’s lawyer, Erasmo Reyna, said he was aware that this week there would be three hearings and that the court was preparing a preventive custody order.

“Today, once again, in my country, the laws and procedures are being distorted and manipulated like persecution instruments for political interests,” Garcia argued in his letter to the President of Uruguay, Tabaré Vásquez.

President Martin Vizcarra denies any political persecution against García and spoke on the phone with President Vasquez on Sunday afternoon.  The Uruguayan government has said it will consider the asylum request.

Last week, District Attorney Perez was successful in his request for preventive custody of Keiko Fujimori and several of her Fuerza Popular party members, under investigation of money laundering of campaign funds from Odebrecht in 2011. The reasons given for their 36-month imprisonment are flight risk and obstruction of justice.

Over the years since and between his two administrations, in 1985-1990 and 2006-2011, Garcia has faced a number of investigations for corruption but in some cases judges would close the investigations, in others the case would be delayed until the statute of limitations ran out.

The current investigation led by Perez is focused on two dockets — alleged bribes received from Odebrecht for the construction of the Metro Line 1, known as the electric train, and for receiving $200,000 in campaign funds in 2006, which Odebrecht’s former manager in Peru, Jorge Barata, says was given to Garcia.  In the Metro case, evidence includes statements given by Garcia’s former deputy minister of transport, Jorge Cuba, and an Odebrecht document indicating that $8 million was given in bribes for the project.

In separate district attorney offices there are five other investigations that involve the former President, including for alleged corruption during his second administration related to the Alto Piura irrigation and hydro project and the Collique mass housing project in northeast Lima.

Garcia argues that an example of the many paid conferences he gave over the years, he received $100,000 as a speaker’s fee from Brazil’s private industry federation, invoiced and filed in his tax returns, but investigative journalist Gustavo Gorriti at IDL-Reporteros said his team has found documents that prove the invoice was back-dated to appear to have come from one source but was in fact paid by the Odebrecht special fund accounts, known as the Caja 2.

 

One Comment

  1. Robert Tansey

    Thank you for the continuing insightful coverage of Peru’s evolving political identity in the face of more and more revelations concerning the leadership of the nation. May I suggest, as an educational project, that some public showings of the Heddy Honigmann documentary “Olvido” would make a marvelous contribution to the dialogue, and wonderful conversation piece as the people of Peru work on what they want in the future.
    Faithful reader

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