After more than three years evading French prosecutors, Chilean police on Wednesday (Jul 22) began the extradition to France of Nicolas Zepeda, accused of murdering his Japanese ex-girlfriend in the French city of Besancon in 2016.
Police escorted the 29-year-old from the seaside resort of Vina del Mar, 120km west of Santiago, where he had been under house arrest, at 8.41pm local time (8.41am, Singapore time) to begin the journey to the airport ahead of schedule.
He is expected to be handed over to French authorities at the Santiago international airport, and is due to board an Air France flight at 2.55pm on Thursday bound for Paris.
Narumi Kurosaki, then 21, vanished from her university in Besancon near the French Alps in December 2016 after eating with Zepeda.
He had returned to Chile by the time her disappearance was reported days later.
French investigators believe he killed Kurosaki in a jealous rage – but her body was never found, despite extensive searches.
Zepeda has been under house arrest with police surveillance in Vina del Mar.
His extradition will end a legal process in Chile that began in March when authorities finally accepted a request from French prosecutors to hand him over.
The process was delayed and complicated by the novel coronavirus pandemic and the closing of borders.
This will be the third extradition of a Chilean to France, and comes even though French authorities refuse to send former Chilean guerrilla Ricardo Palma Salamanca back to his homeland to stand trial for the 1991 murder of right-wing senator Jaime Guzman, who was close to several members of President Sebastian Pinera's cabinet.
"The Zepeda case is of a criminal nature and gender violence is not a political trial nor does it compromise the political relations between Chile and France," analyst Rene Jara, from Santiago University, told AFP.
"The priorities have changed and what's given preference now is maintaining relationships with strategic partners," added Jara.
According to investigators, Zepeda went to Besancon at the beginning of December 2016 to see his former girlfriend.
On the evening of Dec 4, the pair entered her residence together.
French prosecutors say several students heard "howls of terror, cries" that night, but nobody called the police.
Zepeda, the son of a wealthy Chilean family, met Kurosaki in Japan in 2014.
At the time of her disappearance, the pair had broken up and she was in a new relationship, which prosecutors said angered Zepeda, who threatened Kurosaki in an online video he later removed.
Investigators said that in the days before her disappearance, Zepeda flew to France, hired a car and drove to Besancon to meet her.
On the way, they said he stopped to buy matches, flammable liquid and bleach at a supermarket.
Zepeda was questioned in April last year by a Chilean judge in the presence of French investigators. He denies any hand in Kurosaki's disappearance.
While the case has generated little interest in Chile it has been followed closely in both France and Japan.