THE statement by the United States Treasury Department was blunt. It alleges that Tareck El Aissami, Venezuela’s vice-president, is a “prominent” drug trafficker, who amassed great wealth through his connections to gangs across Latin America, including Mexico’s vicious Zetas. Among the now-frozen American assets linked to him are three lavish apartments in the Four Seasons complex in Miami and a Gulfstream jet. If the allegations are true, Mr El Aissami’s carefully cultivated image as a true believer in the socialist ideology of Venezuela’s government is just a cover.
As normally happens when any outsider accuses anyone in the Venezuelan regime of wrongdoing, the country’s leaders have closed ranks. The foreign ministry accused the United States government of committing “an international crime”. Mr El Aissami himself denounces the allegations as untrue, “miserable and vile”.
But rumours of malfeasance have swirled around the dapper politician since he came to prominence under President Hugo Chávez in the early 2000s. He was interior minister, and then governor of the coastal Aragua state. Defectors accuse him of...Continue reading
from Americas http://ift.tt/2lbx5sQ
via https://ifttt.com/ IFTTT
No comments:
Post a Comment