Guatemala president barred from leaving country
Guatemala’s president has been barred by court order from leaving the country amid a snowballing multi-million-dollar corruption scandal engulfing his administration.
"The prosecutors' office sought a ban on leaving the country for President Otto Perez, and Judge Miguel Angel Galvez ordered it," prosecutors said on Twitter on Tuesday.
The ruling was issued only hours after the country’s Congress voted unanimously to strip the head of state of his immunity, leaving him susceptible to prosecution.
He is suspected of being behind a scheme under which businesspeople would pay bribes to avoid import duties.
Prosecutor Thelma Aldana said Perez is being investigated for possible illicit association, bribery and customs fraud.
"Guatemala is showing that nobody is above the law, and as a result this is a message for all current and future public servants that our behavior must be subject to the constitution," she said.
"The president is aware of the new scenario, which was not the most desirable but was very probable," Perez’s spokesman, Jorge Ortega, told The Associated Press. "He has said he will be very respectful and submit himself to the rule of law."
Guatemala's former Vice President Roxana Baldetti, whose ex-personal secretary was named as the alleged ringleader, and a number of Cabinet officials, have already stepped down due to the scandal.
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