They arrest the head of security of the president of Uruguay

(CNN Spanish) — The Uruguayan Flagrancia Prosecutor intends to charge the security chief of the Uruguayan Presidency, Alejandro Astesiano, who has been detained since Sunday night.

Astesiano is being investigated as a suspected member of a gang that is accused of issuing false documents that allowed Russian citizens to obtain Uruguayan citizenship and, from it, Uruguayan passports.

Flagrancia criminal prosecutor Gabriela Fossati, in charge of the case, said that two Russian citizens and a Uruguayan notary public had already been prosecuted for crimes of “association to commit a crime” and “assumption of marital status.” In statements to the local media Teledoce, Fossati said that she received collaboration from the Russian vice-consul.

Fossati explained to local media that he is investigating President Lacalle Pou’s head of security for the alleged adulteration of Russian birth certificates so that people from that country could pretend that their parents were born in Uruguay. He said that between “hundreds and thousands” of people obtained these false documents. The head of presidential custody acted as a kind of manager who facilitated access to this documentation, according to La Diaria.

Astesiano has not spoken publicly about it and CNN tries to contact the assigned defense attorney.

President Lacalle Pou said at a press conference on Monday that he learned of the case when he landed in Montevideo after spending a few days on vacation abroad with his children. Astesiano officially accompanied them as he had been accustomed to doing since Lacalle Pou assumed the presidency in March 2020. He was arrested at the presidential residence of Suárez y Reyes (Montevideo).

The president expressed surprise, although he said he will wait until the investigation is over to decide what to do with his assistant. He called Astesiano’s performance “impeccable”.

Previously, before being part of the presidential custody, Astesiano was the subject of 20 investigations between 2003 and 2018 in different cases. CNN is trying to independently confirm what happened with those inquiries.