The government of Mexico has confirmed Peru's decision to grant diplomatic asylum to former Peruvian Prime Minister Betssy Chávez, who is being tried along with former President Pedro Castillo for the failed coup attempt at the end of 2022. This was confirmed on Monday by the Andean country's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“In an unfriendly act that adds to a series of unacceptable interference actions by the Mexican government towards Peru, that country's embassy in Lima has informed today that its government has granted diplomatic asylum to Mrs. Betssy Chávez,” stated an official communiqué that also confirmed the Peruvian government's decision to break diplomatic relations with Mexico.
This latter measure had been announced shortly before by Peruvian Foreign Minister Hugo de Zela, who stated that they were going to wait “to receive a formal communication from the government of Mexico to begin the process” of the eventual asylum for Chávez, something that had not yet happened, according to the official.
The official communiqué added that the decision taken by President Claudia Sheinbaum's government “evidences the profound lack of interest of the Mexican government in maintaining a relationship with Peru”.
“Peru, a democratic state of law that acts with strict adherence to international law, will consistently proceed in the present situation in accordance with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961 and other relevant international norms,” it concluded.
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When announcing the decision to break diplomatic relations with Mexico, the minister clarified that the rupture “does not mean” that “consular relations” with Mexico have been “broken”.
He also dismissed that a rupture of relations could lead to a possible intervention at the Mexican embassy similar to what happened in Ecuador last year where the correista former vice president Jorge Glas was arrested, since, according to De Zela, “Peru is a country respectful of international law and an action of this type is not provided for in any norm of international law”.
Who is Betssy Chávez?
Chávez is accused alongside Castillo for her alleged participation in the failed coup attempt that then President Pedro Castillo carried out on December 7, 2022, of whom she was Prime Minister.
The politician was released at the beginning of last September while she was in a clinic in Lima, where she was admitted for presenting signs of dehydration after a hunger strike that she maintained for 12 days in the prison where she had been detained since June 2023.
The Constitutional Court (TC) had ordered her immediate release shortly before, determining that she had been a victim of arbitrary detention when the Prosecutor's Office did not request in time the extension of her preventive detention.
