Ex-Peruvian President granted humanitarian pardon

Lima, Dec 25 (IANS) Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski has granted a full humanitarian pardon to imprisoned former leader Alberto Fujimori, who is serving a 25-year prison sentence for corruption and human rights violations.

On Sunday, Kuczynski granted the pardon for the 79-year-old Fujimori, who governed Peru from 1990-2000, after the latter was taken from his prison cell to a private hospital on the weekend to be treated for blood pressure problems, reports Efe news.

Fujimori had presented a request for a pardon on Decemver 11 and that a medical board evaluated him and determined that he suffered from a "progressive, degenerative and incurable illness", adding that the conditions in prison pose a serious risk to his life, health and physical wellbeing.

Kuczynski last week faced a move by the opposition in Peru's Congress to force him from office for graft, but he avoided being deposed due to the votes in absentia of lawmaker Kenji Fujimori - Fujimori's son - and nine other legislators with the Popular Force, which was considered to be the start of an alliance in favour of a pardon.

On Saturday, Fujimori was taken to a private clinic here for a bout of tachycardia and problems regulating his blood pressure, local media reported.

Fujimori is a controversial figure in Peru, having been accused by many of staging a "self-coup" to transform the country into a dictatorship and being at the centre of a vast corruption network, while others claim that he ended a serious nationwide economic crisis and crushed the Shining Path guerrilla insurgency.

Of Peruvian-Japanese heritage, Fujimori ended his presidency in 2000 by fleeing to Japan to escape the huge corruption and human rights scandal that had enveloped his administration, and the Peruvian Parliament impeached him and removed him from office.

However, he was arrested by Chilean authorities in 2005 and extradited to Peru two years later.

In December 2007, Fujimori was convicted of ordering an illegal search and seizure, and was sentenced to six years in prison, and in April 2009 he was found guilty of human rights violations and sentenced to 25 years in prison for his role in killings and kidnappings by the Grupo Colina death squad during his government's battle against leftist guerrillas in the 1990s.