Uncertainty After Fujimori’s Stepping Down

Sept. 18 -- Peru was launched into an uncertain future after President Alberto Fujimori’s stunning decision to call new elections and end his 10-year authoritarian reign.

The main question is how the Latin American country’s powerful military will react.

Rumors swept through Lima that Fujimori decided to call new elections because of resistance from top military officers when he announced on Saturday he would “deactivate” the National Intelligence Service, run by Vladimiro Montesinos, his shadowy aide at the center of a bribery scandal.

Montesinos has been detained by the military, Peru’s independent CPN radio reported today.

The radio station, citing an unidentified military source, said the order for the arrest was issued by Montesinos’ close associate, Gen. Jose Villanueva Ruestra, commander of Peru’s armed forces.

A Defense Ministry spokesman declined to confirm the report.

But Miguel Gutierrez, a reporter for opposition newspaper LaRepublica said he had confirmed the arrest with high rankingmilitary sources.

Bribery Scandal

Montesinos has been at the center of a bribery scandal since a videotape emerged last week allegedly showing the shadowy intelligence man bribing an opposition lawmaker to defect to thepresident’s congressional bloc.

Soon after the revelation, Fujimori announced that he would callnew elections — and not run as a candidate himself. It was ashocking announcement from the man who has led Peru for more than adecade, and who recently won a disputed election for anunprecedented third term.

The radio station said Montesinos was being held on the secondfloor of a building at a Lima air force base, where the NationalIntelligence Service has its headquarters.

Lima Mayor Alberto Andrade has alleged that Montesinos spent Sunday in the National Intelligence Service headquarters destroying documents.

The radio station said Montesinos’ sister had already filed arequest asking a court to order the military to free the54-year-old security chief.