Peru’s Prosecutor’s Office asks Congress to remove Kuczynski’s presidential immunity to prosecute him for the pardon granted to Alberto Fujimori in 2017

The Public Ministry of Peru made this Friday a constitutional complaint against former President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (PPK) for the alleged commission of the crimes of aggravated influence peddling and own passive bribery to the detriment of the State, by granting – on December 24, 2017 – a “humanitarian pardon” to former president Alberto Fujimori, who was then serving a 25-year prison sentence for crimes against humanity.

According they review local media, prosecutor Zoraida Ávalos filed the complaint so that Congress lift Kuczynsky’s legal immunity —A benefit that former presidents in Peru enjoy during the 5 years after leaving office — in order to be able to prosecute him for crimes he would have committed in his presidency.

According to the investigations of the Prosecutor’s Office, Kuczynsky would have given the pardon to Alberto Fujimori to benefit and avoid being removed by Congress for his alleged links in the corruption and bribery case related to the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht.

The complaint presented by the Prosecutor also considers that there is evidence that allows impute former congressman Kenji Fujimori, son of the former president who ruled between 1990 and 2000, for the alleged crimes of aggravated influence peddling, as an instigator, and generic active bribery, as perpetrator, to the detriment of the state.

The measure also targets the former Minister of Justice, Enrique Mendoza, who signed, together with PPK, the humanitarian pardon; and the former Minister of Health, Fernando D ‘Alessio, reported for the alleged crime of passive bribery own, as primary accomplices. The three involved can already be prosecuted by justice because they do not have immunity.

Prosecutor Ávalos will also present the case before the First Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office of Lima Centro, to determine the participation of Alberto Fujimori, the members of the Penitentiary Medical Board, of the Presidential Graces commission, among other mid-level officials, who may be related to the case of the pardon.

PPK’s Pardon and Corruption Cases

The Peruvian Prosecutor’s Office maintains that the pardon would have been given as a “political negotiation”, when the group of Fujimori leaders led by Kenji and his sister and former presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori asked for clemency, in exchange for preventing Congress from removing PPK.

Precisely, these irregularities caused the Peruvian justice to annul the pardon in October 2018 and order that Fujimori remain in prison until the end of his sentence in 2033, when the ex-president would be 94 years old.

Currently, Kuczynski is under house arrest for his alleged involvement in the money laundering case between Odebrecht and his company Westfield Capital, a property he registered in the US between 2001 and 2006, when he was minister of former President Alejandro Toledo. , who is a fugitive from Peruvian justice and was detained in the US since 2019, with an extradition request, accused of alleged corruption in the same case of the Brazilian construction company.

Kuczynski ended up resigning from the Presidency in March 2018, a position he held since 2016. The former president made that decision to prevent Congress from dismissing him for his alleged complicity in corruption crimes related to the Odebrecht case, which would have led to his immediate prosecution.

On the eve, the anti-corruption prosecutor José Domingo Pérez asked a prohibitive order to leave the country against Kuczynski for other alleged acts of corruption in the South Interoceanic Highway project, also awarded to Odebrecht during the Toledo administration. Pérez also requested that he be ordered to appear with restrictions.