Guatemala has ordered the arrest of fugitive former President Alfonso Portillo on charges he embezzled $15.7 million, a judge said on Tuesday. Portillo, who held office from 2000 until January 2004, enraged Guatemala's business and farming elites with fiery populist speeches, and ended his term embroiled in corruption scandals, according to Reuters. Judge Victor Hugo Rios said the former president, who now lives in Mexico, was wanted by federal investigators for fraud. The attorney general's office accuses Portillo of diverting $15.7 million slated for the Defense Ministry into his own accounts in March 2001. "Yesterday, an arrest warrant was issued based on investigations by the public prosecutor's office," the judge said at a press conference. The arrest order is only valid within Guatemala and if the public prosecutor's office hopes to see him tried it will have to extradite the former leader from Mexico. He returned to Mexico soon after he left office, amid a wave of corruption arrests of officials in his former government, including his vice president, Francisco Reyes.
