Bolivia’s Public Prosecutor’s Office orders arrest of former Police commandant accused of genocide

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Public Prosecutor’s Office ordered this Tuesday (7) the apprehension of the former commandant of the Bolivian National Police Corps, Rodolfo Montero, investigated for the death of people in towns like Sacaba, in Cochabamba, and Senkata, in El Alto, during the crisis of 2019.

“The Public Ministry has determined the apprehension of the former commander of the Bolivian Police, Rodolfo Montero, for the crimes of genocide, homicide and serious and minor injuries in relation to the Senkata massacre,” the Minister of Government (Interior), Eduardo del Castillo, posted on social networks.

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The minister attached a photograph of the arrest warrant that refers to the crimes for which the former commander, who was sworn in in mid-November 2019 by former interim president Jeanine Áñez, now detained for almost six months for another case called coup d’état, is accused of.

Montero appeared before the Public Prosecutor’s Office in La Paz to give his statement on the events two years ago, local media reported. The resolution of the Public Prosecutor’s Office is part of the procedure that Montero must undergo until his appearance before a judge in a hearing that will define whether he will be remanded in custody, sentenced to house arrest, or can defend himself while at liberty.

In Sacaba and Senkata in 2019, some twenty people were killed during clashes between protesters and the joint security forces made up of the Army and the National Police. Last August, the Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts (GIEI) of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) presented the report on the events of 2019 and classified those events as “massacres”.

The report established “serious human rights violations” during the social and political crisis in the last quarter of 2019, after the failed elections of that year. After the events in Sacaba and Senkata, some military and police chiefs have been prosecuted while others have left the country or are unaccounted for.

This week, relatives of the victims, activists, and public officials held a march in La Paz to ask the Prosecutor’s Office and the Judiciary for results in these investigations, which, they said, should be extended to former collaborators of Añez and opposition leaders.

On September 3, the Police determined the “definitive dismissal” of Yuri Calderón, also a former commander of that institution, for transgressions to the disciplinary regime, which was communicated by Del Castillo in his social networks.

The main accusation against Calderón, who was appointed during the Morales administration, was the police riots and retreats before the resignation of former head of state Evo Morales.