Peru's former President Alberto Fujimori lost his fight today to avoid extradition from Chile to Lima, where he faces charges of human rights abuse and corruption during his ten year rule.
In a surprise decision which contradicted an earlier ruling by one of its own judges and which cannot be appealed, Chile's Supreme Court said it accepted most of the arguments made by Peruvian prosecutors who want to put Mr Fujimori on trial.
The court was unanimous in accepting the evidence from two notorious massacres - known as Barrios Altos and La Cantuta - in the early 1990s, when Peru was at war with the feared Maoist rebel group the Shining Path.
Students, a professor and a young child were among the two dozen killed in the massacres, which Peruvian state prosecutors blame on death squads run by Mr Fujimori's government.
"(The vote) was much easier than we thought and the important thing above all was Barrios Altos and La Cantuta," said Alberto Chaigneau, president of the courtroom where the case was heard.
"The voting was unanimous," he told a scrum of Chilean, Peruvian and Japanese reporters outside the court.
Mr Fujimori (69), has been in Chile since November 2005, when he was arrested on an international warrant after flying into the country from Japan. He was planning to launch a political comeback in Peru, where he served two terms as president between 1990 and 2000.
Mr Fujimori left office months into his third term when his government collapsed under a huge corruption scandal. He faxed his resignation from Japan.
He is now under arrest in a house just outside Santiago. There is a heavy police presence in the area.
It is unclear when Chilean authorities would deport him.
A spokesman for Mr Fujimori asked the Peruvian government to take measures to ensure the former president's safety once he arrives in Lima, suggesting how divisive Mr Fujimori remains even seven years after his fall from power.
For some Peruvians, he is the man who had the guts to stand up to the Shining Path and to send troops into the Japanese ambassador's residence in Lima in 1997 to end a four-month hostage crisis.
Others view him as a corrupt despot who milked state funds for himself and cronies during his tenure.