I was in a blind alley... I couldn't appear before the pack of wolves and tell them, sirs, I present you with my resignation, my life, my liberty

Alberto Fujimori

In a statement broadcast on Peruvian television on Friday, the fugitive former president said he now realised he had made a serious mistake in hiring Mr Montesinos.

A videotape of Mr Montesinos bribing a congressman spiralled into a series of revelations that led to Mr Fujimori's resignation last year.

"Now I've said it: I'm responsible for the naming of the former National Intelligence Service adviser. Therefore, I assume that grave political error," Mr Fujimori said in his statement, which was recorded in Japan, the country to which he fled after his downfall.

The current Peruvian President, Alejandro Toledo, has urged Japan to hand over Mr Fujimori for allegedly sanctioning two massacres and on charges of dereliction of duty, abandonment of office and embezzlement.

Japan has repeatedly refused to extradite him as he holds Japanese citizenship.

Mr Fujimori has denied any criminal wrongdoing and says he is the victim of a political persecution by the new government.

'Morally unfit'

In the taped message, he also said: "I was in a blind alley... I couldn't appear before the pack of wolves and tell them, sirs, I present you with my resignation, my life, my liberty."

He also stressed that he was not an "ousted" president but "a president who resigned".

The Peruvian Congress ruled that Mr Fujimori was "morally unfit" to rule the country after he fled in November 2000.

Investigators have since uncovered a vast criminal network that Mr Montesinos allegedly directed from his post as spy chief.

He is awaiting trial in a maximum-security naval prison on charges ranging from drug trafficking to directing a paramilitary death squad.