World
Reports allege Josué Gutiérrez’s travel reports included unattributed text from other sources
A television report said that official trip reports by the Ombudsman reproduced paragraphs from earlier publications. It also warned that three documents do not appear in the information submitted by the institution.
A report by Cuarto Poder, cited by El Comercio Perú, said that foreign travel reports by the Ombudsman, Josué Gutiérrez, contain fragments taken from other publications without mentioning their source.
According to that review, the program accessed the reports for 11 official trips made by Gutiérrez outside the country. Of that total, three would not have been submitted and do not appear in the documentation sent by the institution, despite the legal obligation to do so.
Among the documents that were delivered, four include paragraphs extracted from earlier publications. One of the cases mentioned corresponds to the trip to Switzerland and the Netherlands between May 4 and 18, 2024, for which he received US$5,640 in per diem. According to the journalistic report, the report on that trip reproduces parts of a document released on May 7, 2024 by the Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions and was submitted 23 days later.
The criminal lawyer and thesis methodology professor Cecilia Madrid said, in a verification cited by the program, that there was not only copying of texts, but also removal of citations and bibliographic references. In the same vein, constitutional scholar Alejandro Rospigliosi questioned the quality of the content and said that a travel report must detail what the official did and what the benefit was for the country.
When asked about the preparation of those documents, Gutiérrez said that he writes them, although they are later reviewed by his office. On the similarities detected, he said that it “must be” because in some cases they are annual mandatory activities.
The report also included other episodes. According to El Comercio Perú, after a trip to Denmark in November 2023, Gutiérrez submitted a report that, according to the report, derived from a document published on November 8 of that year by the inviting organization. For that activity he had US$2,700 in per diem.
A trip to Barranquilla, Colombia, in October 2023, and another to Dubai, in December of the same year, were also mentioned. In both cases, always according to the version aired by Cuarto Poder and reported by El Comercio Perú, texts from previous publications would have been used without citation, including materials from the Ombudsman’s Office itself.
In addition, the newspaper indicated that, according to transparency information, 11 official trips abroad were recorded, although Gutiérrez’s migration record shows more departures from the country since he took office.
Sources
About this note. Written by El Notero with assistance from artificial intelligence, based on what was published by the cited outlet. El Notero did not conduct its own reporting on this event.
