Alberto Fujimori, the former President of Peru, passed away at the age of 86.

The former Peruvian president, Alberto Fujimori, who led the country for a decade and initially brought economic stability and defeated an insurgency, but later faced criticism for autocratic actions that led to his imprisonment, has passed away at the age of 86.

Keiko Fujimori announced her father's death in Lima on Wednesday through a post on X.

In December, he was pardoned for his corruption convictions and responsibility for the murder of 25 people. His daughter announced in July that he planned to run for Peru's presidency for the fourth time in 2026.

In 1990-2000, Fujimori governed with an increasingly authoritarian hand and was later pardoned in December for corruption and responsibility for the murder of 25 people. His daughter announced in July that he planned to run for Peru's presidency for the fourth time in 2026.

The former university president and mathematics professor, who was a political outsider when he won Peru's 1990 election, made risky decisions throughout his tumultuous political career, earning both adoration and reproach.

He inherited a country devastated by rampant inflation and armed conflict, and he revitalized the economy through daring measures such as privatizing state enterprises. Although it took some time to vanquish the extremist Shining Path insurgents, his efforts were rewarded with widespread approval.

His presidency, however, collapsed just as dramatically.

In 2000, after being implicated in a scandal involving bribes to lawmakers, the president fled the country in disgrace and went to Japan, where he famously faxed in his resignation.

Five years after his arrival in Chile, he was arrested and extradited to Peru, where he faced charges of abuse of power and had hoped to run for Peru's presidency in 2006.

The former president was convicted of human rights violations in his own country, despite not personally ordering the 25 death-squad killings for which he was convicted.

Despite being sentenced to 25 years in prison, Fujimori continued to seek political revenge, planning it from a prison located in a police academy on the outskirts of Lima.

In 2011, Keiko, the daughter of a congressman, attempted to revive the family dynasty by running for president but lost in a close election. She ran again in 2016 and 2021, losing by a narrow margin of 44,000 votes after promising to free her father during her campaign.

In 2000, seven months before his downfall, Fujimori revealed to The Associated Press that he saw his political opponents as mere chess pieces to be strategically moved with a calculated indifference.

"He stated that in Latin America, he is unique because of his special formation in an Oriental environment that emphasizes discipline and perseverance."

In reality, Fujimori's presidency was an authoritarian display of "caudillismo" in a region transitioning from dictatorships to democracy.

His four children, including the oldest, Keiko, who became first lady in 1996, and the youngest, Kenji, who was elected a congressman, survived him.

Fujimori, born on July 28, 1938, on Peruvian Independence Day, was raised by immigrant parents who worked as cotton pickers until they could establish a tailor's shop in downtown Lima.

In 1956, he earned a degree in agricultural engineering, followed by studying in France and the United States, where he obtained a graduate degree in mathematics from the University of Wisconsin in 1972.

In 1984, he was appointed rector of the Agricultural University in Lima and six years later, he ran for president, positioning himself as a clean alternative to Peru's corrupt and discredited political class, despite not having any prior political experience.

He portrayed himself as the honest, hard-working Asian stereotype and promised to bring Japanese aid and technology to an economically struggling country.

In the 1990 election, he rose from a 6% poll position to a second-place finish in the voting, ultimately defeating Vargas Llosa in a runoff.

He later claimed that the victory was due to the same frustration that drove the Shining Path.

He stated that his government is the result of frustration with Peru due to its frivolity, corruption, and inefficiency of the traditional political class and bureaucracy.

Fujimori's initial approach, characterized by a tough talk and hands-on style, garnered praise, but car bombings persisted and annual inflation neared 8,000 percent.

He implemented the same economic shock therapy that Vargas Llosa had recommended, despite having opposed it during his campaign.

Privatizing state-owned industries, Fujimori slashed public spending and attracted record foreign investment.

Fujimori, affectionately known as "El chino," stood out among white politicians due to his commoner's touch, often donning peasant garb to visit jungle Indigenous communities and highland farmers, delivering electricity and drinking water to dirt-poor villages.

Peru's security forces were granted free rein by Fujimori to combat the Shining Path.

In September 1992, rebel leader Abimael Guzmán was captured by police. Regardless of merit, Fujimori claimed the victory.

In April 1997, his most renowned calculation was when he dispatched U.S.-trained commandos into the Japanese ambassador's residence to rescue the 72 hostages held by 14 leftist Tupac Amaru rebels.

On Montesinos' orders, all the hostage-takers were killed, but only one hostage was killed.

The former university professor, who had been in power for just a few years, ultimately represented a step back. He became increasingly authoritarian and used anti-democratic methods to maintain his power.

In April 1992, he accused Congress and the courts of hindering his efforts to combat the Shining Path and promote economic reforms, resulting in their shutdown.

In 1995, Fujimori was elected as president of Peru after a brief border war with Ecuador, and his supporters dominated the new legislative body, which allowed him to serve two consecutive five-year terms.

Critics, both domestically and internationally, heavily condemned him for passing a general amnesty law that pardoned human rights violations committed by security forces during Peru's "anti-subversive" campaign from 1980 to 1995.

Nearly 70,000 lives were claimed by the conflict, according to a truth commission, with the military responsible for more than a third of the deaths. Journalists and businessmen were kidnapped, students disappeared, and at least 2,000 highland peasant women were forcibly sterilized.

In 1996, Congress passed a law that allowed Fujimori to serve a third term as president by declaring his first five years in office invalid due to the new constitution not being in effect at the time of his election.

In a year, Congress dismissed three Constitutional Tribunal judges who attempted to annul the law, and his opponents accused him of establishing a dictatorship through democratic means.

Almost daily revelations exposed the massive corruption surrounding Fujimori, resulting in the prosecution of approximately 1,500 individuals linked to his government, including eight former Cabinet ministers, three former military commanders, an attorney general, and a former chief of the Supreme Court.

Fujimori was granted a humanitarian pardon in December 2017 by Peru's Constitutional Court, which ended years of legal battles against him. He left prison wearing a mask and got in a sport utility vehicle driven by his daughter-in-law.

On Sept. 4, he was last seen in public, exiting a private hospital in a wheelchair. When questioned by the press about his presidential candidacy, he replied, "We’ll see, we’ll see." He had undergone a CT scan.