Peruvian president tries to ease tensions after retired military calls to boycott elections | International | News

AFP

June 18, 2021 – 5:15 p.m.

This Friday, the interim leader of Peru, Francisco Sagasti, rejected a call by retired soldiers for the Armed Forces to prevent left-wing Point Castillo from finally being declared the winner of the June 6 election.

“It is unacceptable (…) that a group of retired members of the armed forces are violating the high command of the army, navy and air force in violation of the rule of law (…),” Sakasthi said in a television news release.

Hundreds of retired officers have signed up to echo allegations of right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori, asking the leaders of the armed forces to stop the new president from being declared “illegal and illegal”. Elections (JNE).

“In a democracy, the armed forces are not intentional, they are completely neutral and very respectful of the constitution,” said Sakasthi, who is due to hand over power to the new president on July 28.

The letter from the authorities was delivered at the Armed Forces Joint Headquarters in Lima on Thursday, while the country was waiting in suspense to resolve the voting challenges for JNE, mostly Pujimori, announcing the winner.

“I have asked the Minister of Defense [Nuria Esparch] Coordinating the sending of these letters to the Ministry of Public Works […] Establish the respective responsibilities by conducting the necessary investigations to determine the conduct that is detrimental to the constitutional order, ”said Sakasthi.

The study of 100% voting tables ended on Tuesday and 50.12% was given to Castillo, who has 44,000 more votes than Fujimori.

A letter from the authorities following a similar letter issued by 64 retired generals and admirals on Monday confirms that “high-ranking government officials” have “participated in support of Castillo”, which Chagasti has denied.

Fujimori has urged Castillo to condemn vote-rigging since he passed the ballot, but without providing hard evidence. Instead, election observers from the Organization of American States (OAS) said the vote was clean without “serious irregularities.”

Three days after the election, the Armed Forces called on the Peruvians to “respect” the election results.

Chagasti called for democracy not to be “endangered”, which has taken us a lot of time and effort to “build.” […] Throughout our turbulent 200 years of Republican life ”. (I)