Sawt Falasteen - US authorizes extradition of Peru's ex-president Toledo: Lima prosecutors

"We have been informed that the US State Department authorized the extradition of Alejandro Toledo Manrique for the crimes of collusion and money laundering," the prosecutor's office said on Twitter.

The office formally known as the Public Ministry said it was carrying out the coordination with "national and foreign" authorities for "the upcoming execution of his extradition."

A resident of the United States, Toledo was arrested in July 2019 on charges of corruption in Peru and has been under US house arrest.

Lima accuses him of having received tens of millions of dollars from the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht in exchange for public works contracts.

Toledo has resided in the United States since the end of his presidency, with a brief break in 2011 when he ran for a second term, but was defeated in the first round.

Prosecutors are seeking a prison sentence of 20 years and six months.

US prosecutors say that Toledo admitted during extradition proceedings to accepting $500,000 in bribes from Odebrecht, and that documents showing he actually received the money are sufficient to surmise that he understood the provenance of the funds.

But the former Peru leader claims he is innocent of the charges and says that a late businessman, Josef Maiman, was in charge of the business dealings, according to Peruvian media.

As of late Tuesday, US officials had yet to announce an authorization of Toledo's extradition.

The former president is one in a long list of former Peruvian presidents either facing legal proceedings or already convicted on corruption charges.

They include Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), Ollanta Humala (2011-2016), Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018), Martin Vizcarra (2018-2020) and Pedro Castillo (2021-2022).

D.Khalil--SF-PST