Alleged coup: Bolivia ex-president’s pre-trial detention extended by two months

Former Bolivian interim president Jeanine Anez’s pre-trial detention was extended by two months Saturday, as a prison official announced the ex-leader will receive medical care at the La Paz penitentiary where she is being held.

Authorities arrested and detained Anez, 53, last weekend on charges — deemed trumped-up by opposition politicians — of leading a coup d’etat against her socialist predecessor, Evo Morales.

Anez was transferred Saturday to the Miraflores Women’s Penitentiary from another detention centre in the Bolivian capital, following what the ex-president said was a “hypertension crisis.”

Prisons chief Juan Carlos Limpias told reporters that “we have everything we need to preserve her health” at Miraflores.

Anez has been charged with terrorism, sedition and conspiracy alongside her former justice and energy ministers, all of whom are being held in pre-trial detention which was extended from four to six months Saturday following a hearing.

Anez, a conservative, served as interim president from November 2019 to November 2020.

Since Thursday, Anez had been asking for a transfer to a hospital, saying she was suffering a “hypertension crisis,” according to documents requesting her release, which were obtained by AFP.

On Friday, in a confusing sequence of events, a three-judge tribunal authorized the move to a hospital and then, hours later, reversed itself. Punch