GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — A Guatemalan lawyer who beforehand represented the United Nations-backed anti-corruption mission in courtroom proceedings was arrested Thursday by brokers from the Lawyer Normal’s Workplace in what some observers noticed as retribution towards those that helped the extremely efficient anti-corruption effort.
Leidy Indira Santizo Rodas is accused of obstruction of justice, however Lawyer Normal’s Workplace spokesman Juan Luis Pantaleón didn’t share extra particulars and the case stays beneath seal.
The Worldwide Fee towards Impunity in Guatemala, higher recognized by its Spanish initials CICIG, supported plenty of high-profile profitable prosecutions, together with taking down former President Otto Pérez Molina and Vice President Roxanna Baldetti.
Over 12 years, the CICIG helped dismantle greater than 60 legal networks, ensuing within the sentencing of greater than 400 individuals. The mission was staffed by overseas specialists and Guatemalans like Santizo.
In 2019, then President Jimmy Morales ended the CICIG’s mission because it continued to upset the nation’s elite.
The U.N.’s remaining presence in Guatemala didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
Final 12 months, Lawyer Normal Consuelo Porras fired Juan Francisco Sandoval, who had headed the workplace of the Particular Prosecutor Towards Impunity, which had labored carefully with the CICIG. Sandoval fled into exile. The U.S. authorities later cancelled Porras’ visa, accusing her of undermining Guatemala’s democracy by blocking investigations into corruption.
Constitutional lawyer Alejandro Balsells mentioned there was “little question” that there was persecution of everybody who labored with the CICIG or Sandoval’s workplace “and everybody who could be an impediment to present abuses of energy.”