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Weekly Report - 27 March 2014 (WR-14-12)
GUATEMALA: Portillo makes key admission
It might have taken nine years but last week former president Alfonso Portillo (2000-2004) admitted that he had received US$2.5m in bribes from Taiwan. He made the admission as part of a guilty plea in the US, where he was extradited in May 2013 to face money laundering charges after having been acquitted in Guatemala in 2011 for other corruption charges. It signals the second time in less than six months that Taiwan’s cooperation with Central America (which, bar Costa Rica, maintains diplomatic links with Taipei rather than with mainland China), has come under the spotlight. In El Salvador former president Francisco Flores (1999-2004), of the main right-wing opposition Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (Arena), is currently being investigated for allegedly accepting US$10m in bribes from Taiwan (see sidebar).
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