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<font size=3>Fujimori guilty of rights abuses <br>
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<a href="http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/04/200947133734920332.html" eudora="autourl">
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2009/04/200947133734920332.html<br>
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</a>Alberto Fujimori, the former president of Peru, has been found guilty
on all charges of murder and kidnapping after a 15-month trial.<br><br>
The former Peruvian leader was found guilty of ordering two massacres and
two kidnappings that took place in the 1990s during the country's
so-called dirty war against the Shining Path rebel group.<br><br>
In a unanimous verdict comprising more than 600 pages, the panel of three
judges read the verdict to a packed courtroom in the capital, Lima on
Tuesday.<br><br>
"The charges have been proved beyond all reasonable doubt,"
said Cesar San Martin, the chief judge.<br><br>
It marks the first time a democratically elected Latin American leader
has been found guilty of rights abuses.<br><br>
Fujimori, who had repeatedly denied the charges, appeared calm in live
televised pictures of the courtroom, listening intently as the verdict
was read out and pausing frequently to take notes.<br><br>
He is already serving a six-year prison sentence for abuse of power in an
unrelated case.<br><br>
<b>Massacres<br><br>
</b>The verdict related to two massacres, the first committed on November
3, 1991 when a group of armed and masked soldiers burst into a party in
the Lima suburb of Barrios Altos, killing 15 people, including an
eight-year-old boy.<br><br>
Several months later, nine university students and their professor were
rounded up by the same "La Colina" squad, taken to a deserted
area of the city and executed with shots to the back of the
head.<br><br>
Fujimori was found guilty in relation to the the kidnapping of a Peruvian
journalist working for a Spanish newspaper and a businessman, both
critics of his government.<br><br>
Fujimori fled to Tokyo in 2000 while still president amid a deepening
corruption scandal and sent his resignation letter by fax from his
hotel.<br><br>
Japan considered Fujimori, whose parents were Japanese, to be a national
and refused to extradite him.<br><br>
He stayed there for the next five years before flying to Chile in 2005
where he was arrested. Two years later he was extradited to
Peru.<br><br>
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