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World

Arraignment date set for Venezuela envoy Saab accused of money laundering

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MIAMI, Oct 18 (Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Monday set a Nov. 1 arraignment date for Alex Saab, a businessman accused of laundering money on behalf of Venezuela’s government, in a case that pits the United States against the socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro.

U.S. prosecutors in 2019 charged Saab in connection with a bribery scheme linked to Venezuela’s state-controlled exchange rate. They have accused Saab and an ally of siphoning around $350 million out of Venezuela and into overseas accounts via the United States.

Washington has also imposed sanctions on Saab over accusations he orchestrated a scheme that enabled him and Maduro to profit from a state-run food distribution program.

Saab’s lawyers have called the U.S. charges “politically motivated.”

Saab, a 49-year old Colombian national, was arrested in June 2020 when his plane stopped to refuel in Cape Verde. The country’s courts approved his extradition following a lengthy legal battle.

Saab appeared during an initial hearing in an orange jumpsuit and blue face mask via videoconference before U.S. Magistrate Judge John J. O’Sullivan in Miami on Monday.

Saab’s lawyer, Henry Bell, asked for the arraignment to be scheduled in two weeks, citing the need to brief his client as well as a pending appeal that says Saab was wrongfully arrested as he had diplomatic immunity.

Over the weekend in Caracas, Saab’s wife Camilla told a small government-led protest that her husband would fight the charges against him.

“My husband Alex Saab will never break down, never,” she said through tears, in a video posted online.

Following Saab’s extradition, Venezuela on Saturday said it would suspend talks with the opposition, citing its “deepest protest” against the treatment of Saab. In a televised speech on Monday, Maduro said he was “outraged” by Saab’s extradition and that he would evaluate what to do with the talks “later.”

Venezuela also revoked the house arrest of six former executives of refiner Citgo, a U.S. subsidiary of state oil company PDVSA, two sources and a family member told Reuters. The former executives were brought to one of the headquarters of the intelligence police, two sources said.

The U.S. government has repeatedly demanded the release of the group, which is made up of five naturalized U.S. citizens and one permanent resident.

Tensions have increased between Washington and Caracas, long ideological foes, after former President Donald Trump in 2019 created a broad sanctions program meant to force Maduro from power amid an economic free-fall.

Venezuela’s government has accused the United States of kidnapping Saab, whom they describe as a diplomatic envoy who was en route to Iran to negotiate supplies of fuel and food that have been interrupted by U.S. sanctions. The opposition says Saab was one of the chief beneficiaries of the country’s state controls and are hoping he will cooperate with U.S. authorities.

“Many doubted that this day would come, because those who have looted Venezuela portray themselves as untouchable,” tweeted Carlos Vecchio, the envoy to the United States of Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido. “But the day always comes.”

A 2016 Reuters investigation found that Saab was also the head of a tiny Colombian trucking company that unexpectedly beat global industry leaders to land a multi-billion dollar project in Venezuela’s Orinoco Belt, the world’s largest crude reserve. The deal was ultimately shelved after outcry from foreign oil companies.

Reporting by Brian Ellsworth in Miami and Alexandra Ulmer in San Francisco. Additional reporting by Vivian Sequera in Caracas.
Editing by Noeleen Walder, Alistair Bell, Rosalba O’Brien and Lincoln Feast.

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World

EXCLUSIVE Some 1,900 Colombian guerrillas operating from Venezuela, says Colombia military chief

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BOGOTA, Sept 30 (Reuters) – About 1,900 fighters belonging to Colombian rebel and crime groups are operating from Venezuela, where they plan attacks and participate in drug trafficking, the commander of Colombia’s armed forces said.

The Colombian government has long said Venezuela’s leadership grants safe harbor to Colombian armed groups, allowing trafficking of cocaine in exchange for a cut of the profits.

But it is the first time the military has given a figure for the number it believes are operating from the neighboring country.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has denied that Venezuela has provided safe harbor for drug traffickers. But he has expressed sympathy for rebels’ leftist ideology and openly welcomed some guerrilla leaders.

Around half of the 2,350 known combatants from the National Liberation Army (ELN) rebel group are in Venezuela, along with about a third of the 2,400 fighters who belong to dissident groups of former FARC guerrillas who reject a 2016 peace deal, General Luis Fernando Navarro told Reuters late on Wednesday.

“In total in the (Venezuelan) states of Zulia, Tachira, Apure and Amazonas, we calculate there could be between 1,100 and 1,200 criminals from the ELN and some 700 from the FARC dissidents,” Navarro said.

“It’s a factor of instability that the strategic rearguard of these structures is in Venezuelan border states. This obviously makes it difficult to combat them,” said Navarro, accusing the Venezuelan armed forces of not pursuing the groups.

The Venezuelan government did not immediately respond to a request for comment for this story.

Colombia’s internal conflict has stretched for nearly 60 years and led to more than 260,000 deaths.

Though the demobilization of some 13,000 members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) under the 2016 accord lead to a reduction in violence, some areas have seen renewed fighting as dissidents, the ELN and crime gangs descended from right-wing paramilitaries battle for territory.

The violence often crosses the border. In Venezuela’s northwestern Zulia state, a local government and a major employer were paying villagers including children to staff narcotics operations, extortion rackets and illegal gold mines, a Reuters report found earlier this year.

Some 80 Venezuelans fight for FARC dissident groups, Navarro said, and some 180 for the ELN.

Commanders from dissident group Segunda Marquetalia, including former peace negotiator Ivan Marquez, Hernan Dario Velasquez and Henry Castellanos are living in Venezuela, he said, as is ELN leader Gustavo Anibal Giraldo, known by his alias Pablito.

The groups attack targets in Colombia and then melt across the border to evade authorities, Navarro said.

One FARC dissident group has taken responsibility for two incidents in June – a car bombing at a military base in the border city of Cucuta which injured dozens, and the shooting of a helicopter carrying President Ivan Duque.

Reporting by Luis Jaime Acosta
Writing by Julia Symmes Cobb
Editing by Rosalba O’Brien

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

Britain sanctions Venezuelan President Maduro’s envoy Saab

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LONDON, July 22 (Reuters) – Britain on Thursday sanctioned one of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s envoys, Alex Saab, in connection with an allegedly corrupt deal to obtain supplies for Maduro’s government-run food subsidy programme.

Saab, a Colombian national, is currently detained in Cape Verde facing extradition to the United States, which accuses him of helping Maduro’s government skirt U.S. sanctions imposed in 2019. read more

Britain said Saab had been sanctioned along with his associate Alvaro Pulido for exploiting two of Venezuela’s public programmes which were set up to supply poor Venezuelans with affordable foodstuffs and housing.

“They benefited from improperly awarded contracts, where promised goods were delivered at highly inflated prices,” the UK Foreign Office said in a statement. “Their actions caused further suffering to already poverty stricken Venezuelans, for their own private enrichment.”

Saab’s lawyers could not immediately be contacted but have previously called the U.S. charges “politically motivated.”

Venezuela’s foreign ministry responded in a statement that Britain was presenting itself as an “anti-corruption judge for the world, while acting as one of the main responsible parties for the theft of assets belonging to all Venezuelans.”

That was a reference to the Bank of England’s refusal to hand over nearly $1 billion in gold to Maduro’s government due to a dispute over whether the gold should go to opposition leader Juan Guaido, who Britain recognises as Venezuela’s legitimate president. read more

Saab was arrested last June in Cape Verde after Interpol issued a so-called red notice.

At the time of his arrest, Saab was en route to Iran to negotiate shipments of fuel and humanitarian supplies to Venezuela, his lawyers previously told Reuters. His plane had stopped in the archipelago nation off the coast of West Africa to refuel.

Also on Thursday Britain sanctioned Teodoro Obiang Mangue, the son of Equatorial Guinea’s president, for misappropriating millions of dollars which London said was spent on luxury mansions, private jets and a $275,000 glove worn by Michael Jackson. read more

Additional reporting by Brian Ellsworth in Caracas; Editing by William Maclean and Chris Reese

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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