Bolivia's Morales: 'The Corrupt Find Refuge in US'

Bolivian President Evo Morales criticized the United States for granting asylum to corrupt former politicians from Latin America.

“The United States houses corrupt (people), among them the former Bolivian President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, who is accused of genocide for his actions connected to the so-called Black October, which took the lives of 60 people and injured 500,” Morales said Wednesday.

President Morales made his comments during a speech in the Bolivian department of Oruro during a ceremony to celebrate the opening of new refinery.

Morales called on the United States to extradite Sanchez de Lozada and other corrupt officials they are protecting. “If they truly want to protect human rights and fight against corruption they should act in good faith,” the Bolivian leader stated.

Aside from Sanchez de Lozada, numerous other fugitives from Latin American are currently living in the United States.

Among them is Luis Posada Carriles, who is wanted in Venezuela, having been convicted of terrorism-related crimes including the fatal 1976 bombing of a Cuban commercial airliner which killed 73 people. Ecuador has also been seeking the extradition of Roberto and William Isaias, who were convicted by Ecuadorian courts of pilfering hundreds of millions of dollars from Filanbanco, a bank they had owned.

In both of those cases, the U.S. has denied extradition requests.