Thelma Aldana, former Attorney General of Guatemala. (Archive image 10.03.2019) Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/O. de Ros A group of former anti-corruption prosecutors from Guatemala, including ex-attorney general Thelma Aldana, denied and dismissed accusations made against them by the Public Prosecutor’s Office in relation to the Odebrecht case. In a statement released on Wednesday (June 4, 2025), Aldana described these allegations as «strategies of criminalization» orchestrated by the prosecution led by Consuelo Porras Argueta, who has been internationally sanctioned for corruption.

The statement was also signed by former anti-corruption prosecutors Siomara Sosa and Juan Francisco Sandoval. The accusations against the former prosecutors, which surfaced this week regarding alleged abuse of authority and other crimes, are similar to those leveled against Colombian lawyers Iván Velásquez and Luz Adriana Camargo, who were former commissioner and official of the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).

In their press release, the former Guatemalan prosecutors emphasized that the «illegitimate maneuvers» being carried out by the Public Prosecutor’s Office aim to «perpetuate the impunity of individuals like Alejandro Sinibaldi, Manuel Baldizón, and Arturo Batres, who, as demonstrated, received over $20 million in bribes from Odebrecht.» Sinibaldi served as Minister of Communications during Otto Pérez Molina’s government (2012-2015), while Baldizón was a presidential candidate before being arrested in the United States for money laundering.

Under the leadership of Velásquez and with the participation of Camargo, who is now the Attorney General of Colombia, the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala dismantled more than a hundred corruption structures within the state between 2014 and 2019, the majority of which were led by politicians, businessmen, and officials. mg (efe, Soy 502)