The Ecuadorean Foreign Ministry said it had received the extradition file of Rafael Correa

(CNN Spanish) – The Ecuadorean Foreign Ministry reported, on Friday, that it had received from the National Court of Justice a file to initiate an official request to Belgium for the extradition of former President Rafael Correa.

With the extradition file and other documents translated into French, the Foreign Ministry indicated that it is ready to formally claim Correa, who was sentenced to eight years in prison for allegedly committing aggravated bribery in the “2012-2016 bribery” case inside. Odebrecht plot.

The ministry said it would “immediately” forward the returned documents through diplomatic channels to the Belgian judicial authority so that they could be processed.

CNN contacted former president Rafael Correa on Friday, who asserted that Ecuadorean authorities would “deceive themselves” by ordering the extradition.

“We won’t do anything,” Correa told CNN. “They will fool themselves again.”

The former president, who has lived in Belgium since 2017, told CNN in April that the extradition request submitted by the National Court of Justice was responding to a request for political asylum, which he confirmed he had received from Belgium, but that was not confirmed. away from the Belgian government despite requests from the Ecuadorean government.

The President of the National Court of Justice, Yvan Sakesella, announced on April 22 that he had signed an order to start the extradition process from Belgium.

Sakesella told CNN last month that despite the ratification of the July 2020 ruling against Correa, it was necessary to have the legal resources to support a complex extradition request. According to Sakesella, it was only this year that these legal resources could be completed, and they had to be attached to documents translated into French by specialized experts.

CNN is seeking the Belgian Foreign Ministry’s reaction to Ecuador’s extradition request, as well as details from the Belgian Commissioner-General for Refugees on Korea’s situation. The Commissioner previously responded that they were not referring to specific cases. The Ecuadorean government reported that it had asked Belgium several times to confirm the granting of political asylum to Korea, but the Foreign Ministry says it has not received a response from Brussels yet.