Saúl Méndez’s Asylum and Flight to Bolivia after 59 Days in the Embassy
The secretary general of Suntracs left the country for Bolivia, the country that granted him asylum. He left a pending court case against organized crime with the prosecutor’s office.
It’s early morning and 56th Street in the El Cangrejo neighborhood is silent. Traffic is sparse, barely broken by the passing of a taxi or the distant echo of a night bus. In that quiet, dark setting, on May 21 of this year, Saúl Méndez, secretary general of the country’s most powerful union, Suntracs, climbed over the fence of the Bolivian embassy. Saul was facing an arrest warrant from the Prosecutor’s Office against Organized Crime for alleged aggravated fraud related to land in Isla Bastimentos, Bocas del Toro.
He knocked on the door at 2:30 a.m. He was carrying a letter in his hand: he was requesting political asylum. Saturday July 19 something in the air announced that the lockdown was coming to an end. Outside the diplomatic headquarters, the morning was different: more National Police officers than usual, movement at the entrance, private cars stopping with questions or honking horns, and an air of anticipation. Saúl Méndez is whisked away to the airport in a private limousine.
