JURIST - Paper Chase: Peru judge indicts opposition leader for human rights abuses

[JURIST] A Peruvian judge [Peru judiciary website, in Spanish] on Thursday indicted [press release, in Spanish] Ollanta Humala [COHA profile; BBC report], the opposition leader who narrowly lost the June Peruvian presidential election [BBC report] to present incumbent Alan Garcia [official website, in Spanish], for murder, torture and kidnapping stemming from his position as an army captain in Peru's San Martin province during the 1990s. Earlier this month, prosecutors filed informal charges [JURIST report] against Humala and sent the case to judge Miluska Cano to decide whether prosecutors presented enough evidence to open a criminal case. Prosecutors charged Humala on the basis of testimony from witnesses that claim soldiers under Humala's command dragged a married couple from their home in 1992, and later found the husband shot in the head but never found the body of the wife.

Humala, who is popular among poor Peruvians, was dismissed from army service in 2000 after spearheading a nonviolent military uprising against then-President Alberto Fujimori [personal website; JURIST news archive]. Though Humala admits to commanding a counter-insurgency base and operating under the pseudonym "Captain Carlos," he denies involvement in the murders. AP has more.

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