Former Colombian president Alvaro Uribe said Friday he hoped the prosecution moved quickly to sentence extradited paramilitary leader Salvatore Mancuso, who claimed the AUC supported Uribe’s 2002 presidential election campaign.
“I hope our complaint can be brought forward or that Mancuso proves his plot against my brother or the meetings with me,” said Uribe by means of his Twitter account.
The former president has asked that Mancuso be investigated for defamation and that he retract his statements that Uribe and his brother had paramilitary ties.
The extradited leader of the now-defunct AUC paramilitary organization said it supported Uribe’s 2002 election campaign in coordination with the politician’s team. Uribe has categorically denied having any ties with paramilitares and has accused the AUC commanders of conspiring against him.
The ex-president also announced that his lawyers will be investigating whether or not his former security chief Mauricio Santoyo made any unjust insinuations against him or the Armed Forces.
“My lawyers want to interrogate Santoyo about his claims of my conduct before he returns from the United States,” said Uribe on Twitter.
Santoyo is currently being held in a U.S. jail as investigations are conducted into his participation with the now obsolete AUC paramilitary organization.
While testifying from the United States before Colombian prosecutors, Salvatore Mancuso said he met with several members of the Uribe campaign to coordinate paramilitary support for the campaign.
The 2002 and 2006 elections are among the most controversial in Colombian history; Thirty eight former congressmen have been sentenced and 140 are under investigation for having used paramilitary support to get elected into Congress.
