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Alejandro Gertz: “The fence over Peña Nieto has narrowed for natural reasons”

2020-02-17T16:16:49.619Z


The attorney general of Mexico talks with EL PAÍS following the arrest of Emilio Lozoya, the former director of Pemex, in Spain


Between 5.30 and 6 in the morning of Wednesday, the attorney general of Mexico, Alejandro Gertz (Mexico City, 80 years old) received a call from the head of the international area of ​​the Public Ministry. I warned him that the Spanish police "had arrested a person who assumed he was this individual," referring to Emilio Lozoya, former CEO of Pemex, close associate of former President Enrique Peña Nieto and to whom Gertz, during the entire interview conducted Friday morning in his office, he is referred to as "this individual", never pronouncing his name or surname. The prosecutor responds concisely and cautiously. On more than one occasion he turns to a smile before addressing the most committed issues, as a warning that the answer will not satisfy.

Question. Do you have proof of the time that the Spanish police had been behind Lozoya?

MORE INFORMATION

  • The fall of Lozoya raises the pressure on former Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto
  • Lozoya's arrest hits Galicia
  • The former director of Pemex carried false documentation and says he arrived in Spain "two days ago"

Reply. I am not sure, because when a red card comes out in the European Union we have to work with all the police, people can move through any country, but the police cannot. As we have information, we are talking with the local police through the Interpol offices and they are giving us the information they have, although they have no obligation to do so. We have been making arrangements with many police groups, I will not tell you how many because it is not convenient to give such detailed information.

Q. What is missing to request your extradition?

R. Gather the documentation, which we already have, express it in the way that Spanish judges demand it and send it through our delegate in Spain and the lawyers who assist us in this, because we cannot litigate in a country that does not It is ours. These 45 days is only a time to make the file available to the judges.

P. Lozoya has rejected extradition. Alonso Ancira, president of Altos Hornos Mexicanos, was arrested in May last year, also in Spain and has not yet been extradited. When will Lozoya be seen in Mexico?

R. Who can give us an idea are the Spanish judges after the hearing that we will have in a month and a half. They will value our arguments and the most we can endorse. The Prosecutor's Office, being an autonomous state body, to obtain the arrest warrants had to prove that he was absolutely right, especially before individuals who have the economic hierarchy and their contacts.

Q. But what is your feeling? Can Lozoya be in two months in Mexico?

A. I have as an immediate antecedent the Ancira case , which is telling us the time we have to arrive is not two months.

P. Spanish judicial sources have pointed out that Lozoya collaborated in money laundering of the Russian mafia and that this could have helped him move around Europe. What signs do you have of it?

A. That information can only be given by the authorities of each State. We don't have it, because if we had it, we should have documented it in the process and in the complaint we made. We are raising a Mexican issue in the Mexican legal framework.

Q. Is this what it looks like?

A. What does your question mean?

P. That in the last months, a process has begun against Rosario Robles [former Secretary of Development with Peña Nieto]; later, Juan Collado [lawyer of the former president, today imprisoned in Mexico]; now Emilio Lozoya. They all have the same link, it seems that the siege on former President Peña Nieto has narrowed.

A. For natural reasons.

Q. What are these natural reasons?

A. Just as you just said, there is a link that unites them.

Q. Lozoya's lawyer said that the former CEO of Pemex was not sent alone. He gave no names, but left it to the imagination of Mexicans. When you hear that, who comes to mind?

A. I do not give the hierarchy of any nature other than the statements made to the authorities. If not, I enter a territory that is not my own and where I can commit a mischief. It is not my intention, I am a trial lawyer and I know what the rules are. Who is outside can say what he wants, who is inside, must measure his words.

Q. Is former President Peña Nieto being investigated?

A. We have a very clear principle: the secrecy in investigations that have not yet generated discomfort about the people being investigated. I would commit a procedural fault there.

Q. Aren't you going to stop investigating the former president?

A. We will continue to do our research. We have no limits other than legal structures and criminal responsibilities

P. Excuse me for insisting, but these natural reasons lead to the same person.

R. We return to the same. You are doing your job. I have to do mine.

P. The head of the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), Santiago Nieto, has assured that there are two more research folders on Lozoya. Are you aware of them?

A. The statements of Public Administration officials are your responsibility, not mine.

P. That is not ...

A. That is a very clear statement.

Q. To what extent do you trust the investigations of the FIU?

A. The Ministry of Finance has some areas that are dedicated to this type of activities: the SAT, this other unit ... I believe and I hope that these activities are strictly done in the legal framework, which is your obligation. And have the prudence and care to handle these investigations.

Q. How is your relationship with Santiago Nieto?

A. I have raised my relationship with this unit many times. I consider that these tasks, which are administrative, that have a support function and sometimes to lodge complaints, as any person has, have to be within a very careful legal framework, because when a complaint is filed you must have the evidence so that the procedure can be sustained.

P. The lack of coordination and disorganization among Mexican organizations is historic. Are you worried about interference from other institutions?

A. The answer is implicit in your question.

Q. But, since you held the position of prosecutor, has that concern increased?

A. The level of problems that this institution has is very varied. Yes, it is one of those.

P. This morning there has been a new protest of the feminist movement in front of the National Palace. Femicides have increased in the country, you yourself have recognized it. Why do you want to remove the criminal type of femicide?

R. Who said I want to remove it?

Q. Don't you want to remove it?

Q. You have to ask the one who said it, because I never said it. On the contrary, so that there was no doubt, I met with a group of deputies and told them that the criminal type must be maintained, solidified, facilitate the defense of the victims and generate a logical behavior like the one being presented. At that time a campaign began to say that I wanted to end the crime of femicide. There was a totally different reaction to what I had said. There was even a statement from the Prosecutor's Office in which he said that the crime of feminicide has to remain with a more careful, more effective, more solid classification in defense of a gender that is being attacked.

Q. Isn't that a modification?

A. That is a strengthening of a criminal type in defense of victims.

Q. Should there be special courts for gender violence?

A. There must be effective courts for the defense of all crimes suffered in this country.

Q. I ask about the specific case of gender violence.

A. I think it is a very good proposal that there are specialized judges, not only in this very serious case, but in other terribly complex ones.

Q. What do you think about the reform of the judicial system?

A. It is a reform that is seeing how to solve the internal problems of the Judiciary. I think it is looking good to establish and standardize the criteria that are often contradictory. It is a good step.

Q. Have you participated in this reform, have you been consulted?

R. Nothing.

Q. And you don't feel that, as a prosecutor, you should have been asked?

R. Man, I'm not that sensitive.

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2020-02-17

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