Juan del Granado
| Juan del Granado | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Mayor of La Paz, Bolivia (2000-2010) | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 1953 Cochabamba, Bolivia |
| Nationality | Bolivian |
| Political party | Movimiento Sin Miedo |
| Occupation | Attorney, Politician |
Juan Fernando del Granado Cosío (born 26 March 1953) is a Bolivian human-rights lawyer and politician, mayor of La Paz (2000–2010) and founder of the Movement without Fear (Movimiento Sin Miedo, MSM), a progressive political party. On November 11, 2013, he officially announced his candidacy for president of Bolivia for the 2014 election.
He is known as John the Fearless (“Juan Sin Miedo”) for achieving in 1993 the first-ever successful prosecution of a Latin American dictator in the ordinary courts for crimes committed in office. Bolivia’s Supreme Court sentenced Gen. Luis García Meza Tejada, the "cocaine dictator," to 30 years in jail without parole or remission for murder, theft, fraud and subverting the constitution. Despite its brevity, Garcia Meza's rule became notorious for its links to the cocaine trade and its use of paramilitary squads run by fascist mercenaries from Italy, Germany, France, Chile and Argentina. At least 50 people died, over 20 disappeared and thousands were arrested, imprisoned and tortured before it fell to a coup by dissident officers in August 1981. The best-known of his foreign aides was the Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie, who was extradited to France in 1983, where he died in jail. As a prosecutor, del Granado was demonstrably fearless in the pursuit of justice, and shrugged off continual death threats.
He is a relative of Bolivian poet Javier del Granado. His wife, Miriam Marcela Revollo Quiroga, serves as an MSM deputy to the Plurinational Legislative Assembly.
Juan del Granado received a law degree at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA) in La Paz. As a law student, he was among the founders of the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR). He directed the Committee Interfacultativo UMSA, a body that defended the university's autonomy during the brutal dictatorship of Col. Hugo Banzer. Despite a climate of harsh political repression, he completed his studies and received his law degree in 1975. He continued his political activities and associations in North Potosi, where from 1975 to 1976 he worked as a journalist for Radio La Voz del Minero (The Miner's Voice Radio) and served as legal counsel to the Catavi and 20th-century mining unions. Toward the end of the corruption- and violence-plagued Banzer dictatorship, del Granado was imprisoned and then exiled. In 1980, when he was able to return to La Paz, he served as legal counsel to the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB) and several unions and social organizations. He was again driven into exile during the brutal "narco-dictatorship" of Gen. Luis García Meza Tejada (1980–81).
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