(CNN Spanish) — The Argentine-Mexican businessman Carlos Ahumada was detained this Friday in Panama when he wanted to go through an immigration checkpoint at the Tocumen airport, the press chief of the National Police of the Central American country told CNN.
The Panama Police said that they had an alert from Interpol that led to the arrest of Ahumada, who is currently in the hands of Immigration. CNN is trying to contact that office to have more information about Ahumada’s situation.
Ahumada’s arrest was also confirmed by a Mexican diplomatic source. CNN is trying to find out the precise charges against Ahumada and whether he already has legal representation.
The Mexican Foreign Ministry told reporters that for the moment it will not comment “since it is a case in progress.”
In 2021, the Attorney General’s Office of the Republic of Mexico (FGR) said in a statement that Ahumada is considered likely responsible “for the crime of generic fraud of the common jurisdiction, in relation to public works contracts in various delegations of the City (of Mexico). )”. Since then, Ahumada has rejected the accusations.
That same year, questioned about Mexico’s extradition request against him, Ahumada said from Argentina—in an interview with Mexican journalist Ciro Gómez Leyva—that “they are not going to be able to extradite me for any reason and take me to Mexico… for other reasons.” “judicials that they invent.”
Ahumada was one of the protagonists of the so-called “video scandals” of 2004 in Mexico.
That year, videos were broadcast in the media in which Ahumada appeared giving wads of bills to René Bejarano, who was then an official in the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador in the country’s capital.
Bejarano then said that he received the money to finance campaigns on the orders of Rosario Robles, who led the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) from 2002 to 2003. Robles rejected the accusations of Bejarano, who went to prison for money laundering and in 2005 He was acquitted by a court due to lack of evidence.
López Obrador, who governed the Mexican capital from 2000 to 2005 and assumed the Presidency in 2018, noted on December 6, 2021—in his daily press conference—that these events represent one of the most difficult moments of his political career. “It hurt me more because it had to do with my honesty, which is what I consider most important in my life,” said the president.
