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Bolivian Court Orders Five Months’ Pretrial Detention for Ex-President Luis Arce

Prosecutors allege he authorized transfers from an indigenous development fund to private accounts during his tenure as economy minister.

Overview

  • The ruling, conveyed by prosecution attorney Eduardo León, requires Arce to be held in a La Paz prison during the investigation.
  • Arce was arrested on December 10 as a suspect in the probe into the Fund for the Development of Indigenous Peoples.
  • Prosecutors had asked for three months of custody, but the court set a five-month term instead.
  • Arce denies wrongdoing and calls the case politically motivated, saying it is meant to divert attention from the country’s problems.
  • He told the court he never received a summons and would have appeared for questioning, adding he attended almost none of the fund’s meetings.