Former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori, 85, has been freed from prison after a court reinstated a pardon of his 25-year sentence for crimes against humanity.
According to the head of the chamber, Valentina Matvienko, the senators unanimously approved the date in a decision that practically kicks off the presidential campaign.
Fujimori, who served from 1990 to 2000 and is now in poor health, left the Barbadillo prison in Lima and was greeted by his children Keiko, a three time failed presidential hopeful, and Kenji, a businessman.
Reports say that Fujimori was sent to prison in 2009 over massacres committed by army death squads in 1991 and 1992 in which 25 people, including a child, were killed in supposed anti-terrorist operations.