LIMA, Peru (AFP) — Rights groups expressed concern Thursday at the choice of 83-year-old Jose Maria Balcazar as Peru’s stand-in president given past utterances on girls and under-aged sex.

Balcazar was on Wednesday named Peru’s interim leader, for a period of just over five months until the next election, after predecessor Jose Jeri was impeached on graft allegations.

He became the South American country’s eighth president in a decade.

But Balcazar’s nomination has angered rights and women’s groups.

In 2023, he told a congressional debate about ending child marriage that “early sexual relations aid a woman’s psychological future.”

Peru, that year, passed a legal reform to ban marriage for anyone under 18. Previously, teenagers could get married with their parents’ consent.

The CNDDHH rights coalition expressed concern Thursday at the appointment “of an authority figure with a controversial public record and statements that justify sexual violence against girls.”

The Flora Tristan Peruvian Women’s Center, for its part, said the choice was emblematic of a “profound ethical and democratic crisis” in Peru — where more than half of women reported being a victim of psychological, physical or sexual abuse by a partner, according to government statistics.

“Anyone who minimises violence against women and girls is not voicing an isolated opinion, but revealing a complacent attitude toward abuse,” the centre said in a statement.

Balcazar has claimed his words have been distorted and taken out of context.

He is also under investigation for alleged misappropriation of public funds and corruption.