The special rapporteur for the Independence of Judges and Lawyers of the UN, Diego García-Sayán, was concerned regarding Evo Morales’s statements regarding a “political meeting” where they decided that the former interim president Jeanine Áñez be submitted by ordinary justice and not in a political trial.
The special rapporteur for the Independence of Judges and Lawyers of the UN, Diego García-Sayán, expressed his concern regarding the revelations of former Bolivian president Evo Morales regarding a “political meeting” in which it was decided to prosecute the former interim president by ordinary means. Jeanine Añez and maintained that she has “the right to a trial of responsibilities.”
“What is worrying is what was revealed this Sunday by former President Evo Morales regarding a political meeting between leaders of the government and the government party, in which they would have agreed that Mrs. Áñez be subjected to an ordinary trial and not to a trial of responsibilities,” he wrote. the United Nations rapporteur in a series of tweets.
Morales, in an interview with the radio station Kawsachun Coca this Sunday, said that together with high-ranking government officials, such as President Luis Arce and the Movement for Socialism (MAS), They agreed that Áñez’s process should be an “ordinary trial” and “not a trial of responsibilities.”
In addition, Morales affirmed that following the ruling of a court in La Paz that last Friday determined ten years in prison once morest the former interim president for resolutions once morest the Constitution and breach of duties “there is no longer a debate” on whether a trial of responsibilities corresponds to him in Parliament.
In this regard, García-Sayán made it clear that “those who have exercised the presidency have the right to be held accountable” and that this is something that is “regardless of how their mandate arose.”
The argument put forward by the Government and the MAS to prosecute Áñez by ordinary means was that as a senator and second vice president of the Senate, she “proclaimed herself” president following the resignation of Morales, his vice president, and the heads of the Upper House and the Lower House, all in the line of succession, during the 2019 crisis.
The Prosecutor’s Office, the Ministry of Government and the State Attorney’s Office considered in the trial that Áñez violated the regulations and that in reality a MAS legislator should assume the Presidency, while the defense argued a power vacuum.
“Signs of possible intervention by political power in this judicial process worry the international community”said García-Sayán, who also referred to the fact that the Bolivian justice might make the “necessary corrections” in instances such as the appeal.
The UN rapporteur also pointed out that the Bolivian office of the United Nations for Human Rights “analyzes the procedural aspects and the follow-up or not of due process.”
Likewise, García-Sayán questioned that by not taking into account Áñez’s presidential term, “justice has failed to analyze and rule on serious events such as those of Sacaba and Senkata.”
In both cases, described as massacres by the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI), more than twenty civilians lost their lives in clashes between demonstrators and the joint forces of the Army and the Police.
This process is paralyzed in Parliament due to the lack of consensus between the ruling party and the opposition.
Rapporteur’s report
Last February, García-Sayán paid a visit to Bolivia to assess the justice situation and held meetings with high authorities, political party leaders, as well as social and human rights organizations.
In the final report of said visit, published in the middle of last month, it is established that the process once morest Áñez “reveals structural problems in the administration of justice, such as the generalization of preventive detention.”
The UN rapporteur emphasized a “great agreement” that allows the reform of justice that is affected by corruption as a “serious problem”, in addition to the “lack of transparency and access to information”, among other aspects. .
Áñez has been in preventive detention since March of last year accused of terrorism, sedition and conspiracy in the “coup d’état I” case, from which the “coup d’état II” process later derived, whose sentence will be read in full this Wednesday in a virtual audience.
