A federal court in California on Tuesday, September 28, authorized the extradition of former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo to his country, where he is being prosecuted in a vast corruption case.
Alejandro Toledo, 75, ruled Peru from 2001 to 2006 and is accused by Lima of corruption in connection with the Brazilian construction group Odebrecht.
The former head of state resided in California, where he was arrested in July 2019. In May 2018, Peru sent the United States an extradition request.
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Alejandro Toledo is suspected of having received $ 20 million in bribes from the Odebrecht group for the highway construction contract.
The ex-president denied his accusations.
The Brazilian construction group is at the heart of a vast scandal in the Peruvian political class and in Latin America.
The federal court which examined the extradition request
"considers sufficient evidence of collusion and money laundering"
, according to the judgment rendered Tuesday.
Now that justice has given the green light, the final decision on the extradition of Alejandro Toledo, placed under house arrest in California, rests with the US government.
Read alsoCan the Odebrecht scandal destabilize Latin America?
According to the US Department of Justice, Odebrecht distributed for more than a decade a total of 788 million dollars in a dozen Latin American countries in order to win contracts.
The company admitted to paying $ 29 million in bribes in Peru between 2005 and 2014.