Ecuador's Correa dismisses his possible extradition

Former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa (2007-2017) on Wednesday called ridiculous the accusations for which he was sentenced to eight years in prison, and believes that the new government will not be able to extradite him to Ecuador.

In an interview with The Associated Press in Brussels, where Correa has been living since leaving office in 2017, he stated that the new government has "failed because the accusations are so ridiculous that Interpol ex officio, I believe, rejects the requests of the Ecuadorian system of justice."

He stressed that "obviously Belgium does not pay any attention to them, but I have to meet with my lawyers in this new stage, because they will try again to harm me," Correa added.

Earlier this week, the former Ecuadorian president was sentenced to eight years in prison in a process that judged a corruption scheme in which senior government officials demanded millionaire sums of money from business people to finance the ruling party, Alianza Pais.

According to the cause, the bribes were in exchange for large public contracts of state infrastructure.

Correa settled in Belgium to be with his children and wife, who is Belgian and the former First Lady of Ecuador, and said he might consider requesting Belgian nationality.

"While I could have done it for 25 years, maybe it is time to think about it seriously."

The former president has a score of judicial processes pending, most of them for embezzlement (of public funds) and for influence peddling.

He has been tried in previous cases, one for kidnapping the then opponent, Fernando Balda, and the second case on corruption with sentencing due this week.

He compared the current prosecution against him to the cases of former presidents Evo Morales (2006-2019), from Bolivia, and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), from Brazil.

"They take someone who committed an offense, corrupt, abusive, whatever, threatening to put him and his family in prison for 10-15 unless he implicates and involves the political objective," he said.