Man arrested after burning ex-girlfriend alive on square in Peru

A man who burned his ex-girlfriend alive on a town square in Peru has been tracked down in Colombia and arrested, the government in Lima said Wednesday.

The man, Venezuelan Sergio Tarache Parra, 19, stands accused of dousing 18-year-old Katherine Gomez with gasoline and setting her alight on a central square in Lima on March 18.

She had broken up with him days earlier.

Gomez was admitted to hospital with burns to 60 per cent of her body and died after six days of agony in a case that shocked Peruvians.

Peru's interior ministry said Tarache would be transferred from Colombia to Peru to be tried.

Security cameras had captured Gomez's attacker fleeing the scene of the crime, and Peruvian police offered a reward equivalent to $12,500 for information leading to his capture.

An Interpol red notice had been issued for Tarache's arrest, according to Peru's consulate in Bogota.

Peru, a country of 33 million, registered 136 femicides in 2022 and similar numbers in previous years, according to official data.

In 2018, a man boarded a bus in Lima, poured gasoline on his ex-girlfriend Eva Agreda, and set her alight. She died days later.

• World