Peru’s jailed former president hospitalized after days on hunger strike

By Sinan Dogan and Serdar Dincel

BOGOTA, Colombia/ISTANBUL (AA) - Former Peruvian President Pedro Castillo has been hospitalized after three days on a hunger strike protesting his rebellion trial.

Castillo was taken by ambulance from the prison on Thursday where he has been held since December 2022 to a hospital in the Vitarte neighborhood in the Ate district, according to local media.

Authorities said Castillo was transferred to the hospital on suspicion of fluid-electrolyte imbalance and mild dehydration.

Judge Norma Carbajal said the 55-year-old was not in a life-threatening condition, adding that the former president was hospitalized for precautionary purposes and that his condition is stable.

Meanwhile, Castillo's visitor rights were suspended due to his hunger strike, which violated prison rules.

His former lawyer Walter Ayala announced that Castillo had applied to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to have his rights restored.

Castillo announced on March 10 that he had begun a hunger strike in prison in protest of his rebellion trial.

Denying the charges against him, Castillo claimed that he had been unjustly imprisoned for crimes he had never committed.

Impeached by Congress on Dec. 7, 2022, he was sentenced to 18 months of preventive imprisonment on Dec. 14, 2022.

Castillo, who has been on trial in Peru since December 2022 for allegedly leading a criminal organization and committing public crimes, had his preventive prison sentence extended for another 14 months last June.