EX-PERU ATTORNEY GENL SENTENCED TO PRISON FOR CORRUPTION

LIMA -- A court has sentenced Peru's former attorney general - for years
accused of protecting once-feared intelligence chief Vladimiro Montesinos -
to 10 years in prison on corruption charges.

In addition to the prison term, delivered late Thursday, the criminal court
fined former Attorney General Nelida Colan the equivalent of $570,000.

The court found Colan guilty of crimes related to receiving $10,000 a month
from Montesinos, failing to show how she paid for a $750,000 house and
shelving an investigation into a bribery case involving the ex-spy boss.

The bribery scandal - sparked by a secret videotape showing Montesinos
apparently paying an opposition congressman $15,000 to join the
government's ruling bloc -triggered the downfall of former President
Alberto Fujimori's decade-long regime in 2000.

Colan, once considered a close Montesinos ally, is accused of having
quashed or shelved several criminal investigations aimed at the former
intelligence chief.

In 1996, Colan ignored testimony from a high-profile cocaine trafficker
that he had paid Montesinos $50,000 a month in exchange for use of a jungle
air strip to ferry out shipments of raw cocaine.

Colan, who was arrested in July 2001, said that she is innocent of the
charges and that she will appeal the decision to Peru's Supreme Court.

Fujimori fled to Japan in 2000. He is wanted on corruption charges by
Peruvian authorities but is protected from extradition by Japanese citizenship.

Montesinos is in a maximum security prison facing dozens of charges
including influence peddling, drug trafficking and human rights abuses.