MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

New bad news for Menem.

A judge yesterday threw out two prison exemption requests filed by followers of former Peronist president Carlos Menem, who lives in Chile and is on the run from Argentine courts.

Judge Alberto Baños rejected the petitions and confirmed that Menem would be immediately arrested if he set foot on Argentine soil.

A similar petition was turned down two weeks ago by Federal Judge Jorge Urso.

Menem, aged 74, is undergoing investigation on charges of corruption and tax evasion. He lives in Chile with his beauty queen wife Cecilia Bolocco and their one-year-old baby boy Máximo Saúl.

Elected to office to run Argentina for two consecutive terms between 1989 and 1999, Menem last year failed to win a third term. Despite having won the first round, he walked out of the second round against Néstor Kirchner as polls showed we was heading to an overwhelming defeat. He claims he will run again in 2007.

Menem has for months said from Santiago that his return to Argentina was imminent, but it has so far failed to materialize as judges have been inflexible to his lawyers' requests