Former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo arrived in Lima on Sunday after being extradited from the United States to stand trial on corruption and money laundering charges in the Odebrecht scandal, a case for which he could face up to 20 years in prison.

Mr. Toledo, 77, the head of state from 2001 to 2006, had been wanted by Peruvian justice since 2018. He arrived in Los Angeles yesterday under the surveillance of Interpol agents, who then handed him over to Peruvian police and prosecutors. as shown by footage broadcast by Peruvian television networks.

He is accused of taking $35 million in bribes from the Brazilian construction group Odebrecht – at the heart of a huge corruption scandal in Latin America – in exchange for public works contracts.

On Friday, Mr. Toledo, who had been living in the US for years, surrendered to a court in San Jose (California) to be remanded in custody pending his extradition, after exhausting the legal means available to him to fight this decision. .

After being brought before a judge and undergoing a medical examination, Mr. Toledo was to be taken to Barvadillo Prison, inside the Special Operations Directorate of the police, where two other former presidents, Pedro Castillo (2021-2002) and Alberto Fujimori, are being held. (1990-2000).

He will be remanded in custody for 18 months, pending the start of his trial.

The economist and former president was arrested in 2019 in the USA, where he was working at Stanford University, from which he received a doctorate. He was initially jailed, then placed under house arrest in San Francisco, required to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet.

Mr. Toledo, who has pleaded not guilty, has repeatedly appealed to the courts to avoid extradition. His latest appeal was rejected on Thursday.

A lawyer for the former head of state, citing his state of health, said he would ask that Mr. Toledo remain under house arrest and not in prison.

Mr. Toledo is among a total of seven former Peruvian presidents who have been convicted or faced criminal charges for corruption: the list also includes Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), Oyada Umala (2011-2016), Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016 -2018), Martin Vizcarra (2018-2020) and Pedro Castillo (2021-2022). Another former president, Alan Garcia, killed himself to avoid arrest in 2019.