Guatemala leader tries to expel U.N. anti-corruption chief

Guatemala City — President Jimmy Morales announced Sunday he was expelling the head of a U.N. anti-corruption commission that is investigating his campaign’s financing — only to have the order quickly blocked by Guatemala’s top court.

Morales’ move also drew criticism from the international community, including the United States, and at least two protests sprang up in the capital to decry the order.

A video posted on the government’s Twitter site early Sunday showed Morales declaring Ivan Velasquez “non grata” and ordering him to leave the country immediately. The president also announced he was firing Foreign Minister Carlos Raul Morales for failing to carry out the expulsion.

Morales said nothing of kicking out the entire commission of foreign experts, but the expulsion would leave its future unclear. The decade-old panel has worked with Guatemalan prosecutors to root out corruption and was key to bringing down former President Otto Perez Molina, who was forced to resign in 2015 and remains in prison.

Within hours, Francisco de Mata Vela, head of Guatemala’s Constitutional Court, said that body had issued a temporary injunction blocking the order to expel Velasquez. The court will now analyze the case before reaching a definitive decision. It was not clear how long that would take.