Bolivian prosecutor Sandra Gutiérrez announced that an arrest warrant would be issued against former president Evo Morales (2006-2019) so that he can testify before the public prosecutor’s office in the ongoing investigation into a case human trafficking and rape. Morales’ entourage had already warned that he would not run and denounced that it was “political persecution”.
The complaint in the possession of the Bolivian public prosecutor’s office accuses Morales of having committed the crimes of human trafficking and rape (rape of a person over 14 years old and under 18 years old) with a minor with whom he allegedly had a child. . The victim, aged 15 at the time, belonged to a youth group created by the former president during his presidency, called “Generation Evo”. According to the complaint, this allegedly happened in 2016, when Morales was president.
The prosecutor of the southern region of Tarija, where the investigation is ongoing, says the arrest is appropriate because Morales and the other people charged “were duly informed without any violation of any of their rights.”
Morales was summoned to testify in Tarija, but his defense presented a legal excuse for not appearing, alleging that there is a constitutional ruling that orders the case to be handled in the central region of Cochabamba, where the former president and head of government The movement towards socialism lives (PLUS). “He will not come because all this is blackmail,” defended Pedro Llanque, leader of the Unity Pact of Morales supporters.
In addition to the former president, two other people who are also under investigation in this case and who also did not appear have been called to testify. The prosecutor claims that “no rights are violated,” as assured by Morales and his lawyers, and said that “everything is done transparently and in accordance with the legal standard.”
Report political persecution
Social organizations linked to Morales warned today that if the prosecution issued an arrest warrant for the former president, they would trigger a national roadblock.
The former Bolivian president, far from the government of President Luis Arce, declared that he would defend himself from this “legal battle”, which for him is “political persecution” and indicated that there were more than 200 lawyers who called him to defend him “for free”.
The complaint against the former president was filed on September 26 at the Tarija prosecutor’s office, three days after the arrival in La Paz of a march led by Morales for various demands, including the validation of a party congress during which it was named “unique”. candidate” of the MAS for the 2025 general elections.
The Puebla Group, a political and academic forum made up of representatives of Latin America’s political left, has expressed concern about the “lawfare campaign” or political judicialization against the MAS leader.
