Court in Bolivia orders arrest of former President Evo Morales for abusing minor when he was in office

A judge in Bolivia ordered the arrest of the country’s former President Evo Morales over his alleged abuse of a teenage girl while he was in office. On Friday, the judge in the southern city of Tarija called for Morales’ arrest after Bolivia’s first Indigenous president skipped a hearing on his pre-trial detention for a second time.

The Friday ruling raised stakes in the state’s months-long showdown between the current and the former leader. According to The Guardian, the ruling was broadcast on state television for the citizens to watch. The judge ordered Morles’s assets to be frozen and banned the former president from leaving the country.

“There’s been a warrant ordered for his search and arrest,” said Judge Nelson Rocabado after a hearing in Tarija, where the alleged victim lives. Morales, who rose from poverty became one of the most prominent and longest-service leaders in Latin America. In the past few months, Morales managed to bring thousands of people on the streets to protest against the accusations hurled at him.

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What the case is about?

Morales was accused of abusing a 15-year-old girl while he was in the office in 2015. It was also alleged that he fathered a child with her the following year, which would have been considered statutory rape under the Bolivian law. The Bolivian leader has neither confirmed nor denied the allegations.

Prosecutors pursuing the case have charged him with trafficking. They argued that the girl’s parents enrolled her in the youth guard of Morales’s political movement when he was president “with the sole purpose of climbing the political ladder and obtaining benefits … in exchange for their underage daughter”. Sandra Gutiérrez, the prosecutor leading the case that the charges carry a sentence of between 10 and 15 years in prison.

It is pertinent to note that the girl’s father has been in preventive custody since October. The prosecutors called the judge to place Morales under detention after he skipped the pre-trial hearing twice. The lawyers of the former president told the court that he was suffering from a health problem.

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On Friday, the judge rejected the medical reports and pressed on with the hearing in Morales’s absence. Meanwhile, Morales has maintained that he has been a “victim” of legal warfare carried out by his ally-turned-rival, Bolivia’s current President Luis Arce. Outside the courthouse, a group of women identified themselves as mother and carried banners that read “Evo Morales abuser, girls are not to be touched," demanding justice in the case.

With inputs from agencies.