Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former president of Honduras, will be extradited to the United States next week, where he faces drug trafficking and firearms charges, Honduran Security Minister Ruben Sabillon said on Wednesday.

It comes after the country's Supreme Court authorized Hernandez's extradition last month.

US prosecutors allege 53-year-old former president received drug money between 2004 and 2022 to finance his political rise.

They said he received millions of dollars from drug traffickers for protecting them, including from Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

"The extradition will happen next week," Sabillon said. "We have to get in touch with US authorities for his surrender," Sabillon told local TV news channel HCH.

Hernandez was arrested by authorities in Honduras on February 15, in a dramatic raid, where police led him away in shackles and wearing a bulletproof vest.

A former US ally

Hernandez's extradition represents a major fall from grace for a leader once considered a top US ally. His government was the recipient of money from Washington to improve the country's security.

But the ex-president's brother, former Honduran congressman Tony Hernandez, has already been sentenced to life in prison by a US judge in March last year for drug trafficking.

The judge said Tony Hernandez had accepted millions in bribes to funnel into the ruling party's coffers for elections in 2009, 2013 and 2017 to benefit his brother.

jcg/jsi (Reuters, EFE)