對獨裁者或迫害人權的領袖而言，愈來愈無路可逃了。過去流亡到異國，過著舒適日子的時代愈來愈難尋了。
智利法庭的判決令人鼓舞，過去幾年來，包括：英國國會決議智利前獨裁者Pinochet，塞比亞將南斯拉夫領袖Milosovic送到國際法庭，奈及利亞將利比亞獨夫Taylor送到Sierra Leone的最高法院審判
哇，諸多好消息，不知會不會讓這些獨裁者更為謹慎呢？讓各國領導人更小心呢？
Court approves extradition of Fujimori
By Simon Romero Published: September 21, 2007
SANTIAGO, Chile: Chile’s Supreme Court Friday approved the extradition of Peru’s former president, Alberto Fujimori, on charges of human rights abuses and corruption related to his time in power during the 1990s.
The ruling, which cannot be appealed, could set an important international precedent for extradition cases of former heads of state wanted for atrocities in other countries, according to human rights advocates.
It could facilitate future extradition requests because they would not have to go through international mediators or governments; instead the request could go directly to domestic courts, they said.
"This is a breaking point in international law," said Alfredo Etcheberry, the Chilean lawyer who represented Peru’s government in the extradition case. "It is the first time Chile grants delivery of a former head of state by way of extradition to the country where he is wanted." Following the ruling, Fujimori, 69, could be transported from Chile to Peru as early as Friday, Chilean government officials said, although they did not rule out logistical delays.
Fujimori’s return to Peru, where he would be imprisoned while awaiting trial, is expected to roil the country, where he was president from 1990 to 2000. The court ruling could hinder his ambitions to return to power there, although he still has a loyal group of political followers in the country.
has retained his following despite the revelations of abuses and generalized corruption in institutions controlled by him and his former spy chief, Vladimiro Montesinos.
"It was easier than expected to get to this point," said Justice Alberto Chaigneau, who announced the ruling, pointing to the court’s unanimous decision on the human rights charges.
Those charges were related to the activities of the Colina Group, a secretive squad of military intelligence officers believed to have carried out more than two dozen extrajudicial killings in the early 1990s. Massacres carried out by the squad resulted in the deaths of 25 people in 1991 and 1992.
"This is not vengeance but justice," said Gisela Ortiz, the sister of one of nine students killed by the group at La Cantuta University in 1992. The squad’s operatives shot and killed the students and a professor, later hiding their bodies. Ortiz gathered Friday with other relatives of victims at a park in Lima.
Fujimori has denied the charges against him, despite videotaped evidence of the death squad’s operational head stating that Fujimori specifically approved policy creating the group.
After faxing his resignation from Tokyo in 2000, he received citizenship from Japan, from where his parents had emigrated to Peru.
In 2005, Fujimori unexpectedly ended a self-imposed exile in Japan and traveled to Chile, apparently intending to return to Peru and try for a political comeback. But he was arrested soon after he arrived, and Peru quickly sought extradition.
"This will strengthen us because the truth will become known," Santiago Fujimori, Fujimori’s brother and a congressman in Peru, said in comments to Andina news agency.
The ruling could potentially ease political tension between Chile and Peru, which have been at odds for decades over maritime boundaries. The Chilean president, Michelle Bachelet, Friday phoned her Peruvian counterpart, Alan García, to inform him of the court decision.
Chile’s Supreme Court had been reviewing the case since July, when a single Supreme Court judge ruled against extraditing Fujimori.
Under Chilean law, the case was appealed to the full court. The court said last week that it had reached a decision, but delayed revealing its ruling until after a national holiday that ended on Wednesday.
José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director for Human Rights Watch, said the ruling fit within an international trend started when the British House of Lords ruled that the former Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet could be extradited to Spain to face charges of torture.
Former heads of state have been turned over to international tribunals in two other cases in recent years, with Serbia delivering Slobodan Milosevic to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and Nigeria handing over Charles Taylor, the former dictator of Liberia, to face trial by the Special Court for Sierra Leone.
But the Chilean decision stands in contrast to these cases, since it was a domestic court and not the executive branch in negotiation with other governments that ruled to extradite a former head of state. The Supreme Court here was acting on an extradition request filed by Peruvian government prosecutors.
The decision also holds significance for Chile’s judicial institutions, given the court’s previous hesitance to grant extradition of a Nazi war criminal and the perception that the court lacked independence during and following the dictatorship of Pinochet, who presided over a history of human rights abuses.
"This is a significant historical decision for both Chile and Peru," Vivanco, the Human Rights Watch official, said in an interview here. "It involves the workings of domestic institutions, not political negotiations between governments."
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