Lima, Feb 10 (IANS): A worldwide arrest warrant is issued for former President Alejandro Toledo for allegedly accepting $20 million in bribes from Brazilian company Odebrecht, a media report said on Friday.
Judge Richard Concepcion on Thursday also ordered Toledo's subsequent 18-month preliminary imprisonment in the graft case involving the Brazilian construction company, Efe news reported.
Concepcion, head of the First Preparatory Investigation Court of the National Criminal Chamber, declared well-founded the petition for preventive detention requested by the prosecution.
Anti-corruption Prosecutor Hamilton Castro charged Toledo who was in power from 2001 to 2006, with the alleged crimes of influence peddling and money laundering.
Toledo is currently outside Peru. He was reported to be in Paris last weekend, although he resides in the US, where he works as a researcher at Stanford University, California.