2 Peruvian news execs sought in suspected bribery scheme

By The Associated PressAnd Freedom Forum Online staff

01.22.01

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Eduardo Calmell del Solar Diaz

LIMA, Peru — A judge has issued arrest orders for two news-media executives after viewing a videotape reportedly showing them with fugitive ex-spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos counting some $2 million in cash.

Eduardo Calmell del Solar Diaz, director of Expreso, and Vicente Silva, director of cable news station Channel 10, are wanted for "supposed illicit enrichment and complicity in corruption of officials," court spokesman Andiolo Zevallos said Jan. 19.

Calmell del Solar Diaz's lawyer, José Rodriguez, said his client would turn himself in once it was clear what he was being accused of. He declined to say whether Calmell del Solar received any money from Montesinos. Neither Calmell del Solar nor Silva could be reached for comment.

Until a few years ago, Expreso enjoyed a reputation for serious reporting. But last year, during then-President Alberto Fujimori's re-election bid, Expreso and Channel 10 joined smear campaigns against Fujimori's opponents.

More than a half dozen other tabloids that focused on sex-and-crime stories also took part in coordinated attacks against the opposition, reportedly with financing from Peru's intelligence service.

At The Freedom Forum's Latin America Media Forum in Lima in March last year, Calmell del Solar Diaz asserted there was no such thing as a good press and a bad press in Peru. "No one can set up as a judge of that. That would be a principle of a dictatorship," he said.

Calmell del Solar Diaz also said during the program that no Peruvian newspaper was neutral, and none was objective. "All take stands," he said. "Everyone backs someone.

"This is not bad," he added, calling such partisanship the exercise of freedom.

The video, which purportedly shows Montesinos counting the cash and the men signing a document, has not been released publicly. Unconfirmed newspaper reports said Montesinos gave Calmell del Solar Diaz and Silva $2 million in cash. There was some speculation in news reports that the former spymaster had controlling shares in the cable TV station.

Montesinos, who served for a decade as Fujimori's top adviser, is wanted on charges ranging from money laundering and influence peddling to illegal arms dealings. He is believed to have fled Peru in October as news of an alleged web of corruption came to light.

Fujimori last year won re-election to a third five-year term amid widespread irregularities and allegations of fraud. But it was the release in September of another video — showing Montesinos apparently bribing a newly elected opposition congressman — that led to Fujimori's downfall.

A Peruvian congressman, Fernando Olivera, told Frecuencia Latina television yesterday that "a good Peruvian" supplied $100,000 to pay an unidentified middleman for the video. Olivera refused to identify those directly involved in the transaction.

Alberto Kouri, the lawmaker seen in the video receiving a thick envelope of cash in the spymaster's office, fled the country in October, hours after Congress voted to charge him with corruption, illicit enrichment and malfeasance.

Fujimori later fled to Japan, his ancestral homeland. He was replaced by interim President Valentin Paniagua, whose mandate is to hold clean elections in April and turn power over to a new government next July.

Investigators are reviewing hundreds of videos left behind by Montesinos of his meetings with politicians, election officials, military leaders, celebrities and businessmen. The British Broadcasting Corp. reported today that the Peruvian prosecutor investigating Montesinos has warned that the videos may unleash a new wave of scandals.