Antauro Humala, brother of Peru’s former president Ollanta Humala, was released on Saturday afternoon after a reduction in his 19-year sentence because of time devoted to work and education while in prison, according to a video on the RPP Noticias website.
Humala, wearing blue jeans, a long brown coat over a gray sweater and a smile, was accompanied by three officials wearing black-and-gray uniforms as he walked out of the Ancon II prison amid chants from supporters, according to the RPP Noticias video.
“The inmate has worked and studied 3,667 days, which has allowed him to redeem one year and seven months on his sentence,” the country’s penitentiary authority INPE said Friday night in a statement on Twitter.
Humala, a former army major who led an uprising in 2005, was serving a sentence for the crimes of rebellion, kidnapping and homicide in an attack on a police station in the southern town of Andahuaylas. The move comes as President Pedro Castillo, who pledged to grant Humala a presidential pardon in last year’s electoral campaign, faces impeachment efforts and a series of legal investigations. Humala supported Castillo’s presidential bid.
“We welcome the release of Antauro Humala after a prolonged prison sentence, an unfair sentence,” Vladimir Cerron, leader of leftist party Peru Libre, said on Twitter.
Humala’s revolutionary movement reaffirms the superiority of the indigenous cultures of the Andes, the Inca empire and promotes the nationalization of companies. Many of its members and sympathizers are army reservists.
The decision was criticized by, among others, former Interior Minister Carlos Basombrio who said on Twitter that Humala’s release comes amid Castillo’s plans for street protests in his favor to distract from the legal cases against him.
