Back

Weekly Report - 18 July 2019 (WR-19-28)

Colombia’s Duque faces dilemma over extradition

Colombia’s President Iván Duque is in a quandary. While bewailing the fact that his government was thwarted in its efforts to see the vanished senior Farc leader Seuxis Paucias Hernández Solarte (‘Jesús Santrich’) extradited to the US, Duque has had to accept the extradition from the US back to Colombia of Andrés Felipe Arias, a former agriculture minister and one of the closest allies of former president Alvaro Uribe (2002-2010), the founder of the ruling right-wing Centro Democrático (CD). Arias was found guilty by Colombia’s supreme court (CSJ) in July 2014 of embezzling state subsidies for poor farmers and sentenced to 17 years and four months in prison. He left the country for “a family holiday” in the US shortly before his conviction and did not return. Uribe is championing a contentious congressional reform that would see Arias granted an appeal. If Duque backs the reform, his commitment to combat corruption could be questioned; if he opposes it, he will upset his own party and his mentor.

End of preview - This article contains approximately 1333 words.

Subscribers: Log in now to read the full article

Not a Subscriber?

Choose from one of the following options

LatinNews
Intelligence Research Ltd.
167-169 Great Portland Street,
5th floor,
London, W1W 5PF - UK
Phone : +44 (0) 203 695 2790
Contact
You may contact us via our online contact form
Copyright © 2022 Intelligence Research Ltd. All rights reserved.