The Chavista delegation arrived at the dialogue table in Mexico with posters demanding the release of Alex Saab, the Maduro leader jailed for money laundering

The new round of negotiations between the Maduro regime and the Venezuelan opposition is increasingly complicated: yesterday the scheduled session was suspended after the Chavismo delegates did not arrive in Mexico City and today, 24 hours more later than expected, they arrived at the meeting place. but with provocative posters of Alex Saab, the leader of Maduro accused of millionaire money laundering and whose extradition to the United States has already been approved by the justice of Cape Town The delegation arrived a day later than expected and he was photographed with posters of the Colombian businessman whose extradition to the United States has already been approved by Cape Verde, where he is arrested.

It is that in recent weeks, the Venezuelan regime has launched its latest maneuver to try to stop the extradition. He assures that Saab is a diplomat of his government and asked to be integrated into the dialogue table in Mexico.

The businessman’s name appeared in the media when former Venezuelan prosecutor Luisa Ortega Díaz accused him in 2017 of being one of the straw men of the Venezuelan dictator.

Of Lebanese descent and born in the town of Barranquilla, Colombia, Saab is linked to several companies, but his main connection to Maduro is said to be through Group Grand Limited (GGL), which would sell diet food to subsidized prices to be distributed in humble neighborhoods. However, Saab and Maduro have been accused on different occasions of using the program, known as CLAP, to illegally seize hundreds of millions of dollars.

In fact, Saab, along with three of Maduro’s stepchildren and nine others, were sanctioned in July 2019 by the United States for this precise maneuver. For this reason, everyone has frozen any holdings or real estate they may have in the United States.

Alex Saab engaged with Maduro’s informants to lead a large-scale corruption network that they cruelly used to exploit the starving population of Venezuela. The Treasury targets those behind Maduro’s sophisticated bribery schemes, as well as the global network of shell companies that benefit from the previous regime’s military-controlled food distribution program, ”said at the time. the secretary of the US government. .

“The corruption network that runs the CLAP program has allowed Maduro and his relatives to rob the Venezuelan people. They use food as a form of social control, to reward political supporters and punish opponents, while pocketing hundreds of millions of dollars through a series of fraudulent schemes, ”he added.

Journalist Gerardo Reyes, author of the book Alex Saab. The truth”, revealed that the enigmatic Barranquilla businessman benefited from a network of shell companies dedicated to fictitious imports, while handling various commercial affairs of the Bolivarian regime, managed to amass a fortune of at least a billion dollars. “He solved the most pressing problems of the Venezuelan government day by day. When the food problem had to be solved because there was no milk, they called him; when there was no fuel, he would negotiate the shipment of fuel tanks from Iran, ”he told Infobae a few days ago.

In this way, she established close trade and diplomatic relations with countries like Turkey, Iran and Russia, with the main objective of help the Venezuelan dictator to circumvent international sanctions.

There were dozens of shell companies that he developed in various countries in Latin America, Europe and even the United States. But Saab’s main link to Maduro is through Group Grand Limited (GGL), which reportedly sells diet food at subsidized prices for distribution in poor neighborhoods. However, both have been accused on different occasions of using this program, known as CLAP, to illegally obtain hundreds of millions of dollars. They have even been reported to have delivered spoiled food.

The third round of talks, which take place in Mexico with Norwegian arbitration, should have started on Friday, but Maduro’s representatives have planted opposition by not attending the meeting.

Although the government has not justified his absence, Venezuela’s executive vice president Delcy Rodríguez on Friday attacked the US ambassador to the country, James Story, whom he accused of giving orders to the opposition “on what to do. dialogue table”.

A message that was endorsed by Jorge Rodríguez, president of the Venezuelan Parliament and head of the government’s negotiating team, who wrote that the Venezuelan executive “will never participate in an agenda that this character is trying to impose”, in reference to the ambassador.

It was the representative of the opposition delegation, Gerardo Blyde, who reported in a statement Friday evening that the Chavistas did not attend the meeting. Despite this absence, Blyde ratified the opposition’s “commitment” to “continue negotiating on the agreed program.” As he explained, in this cycle it was planned to “set up a social care table” and “discuss the construction of the justice system”.

After the failure of five attempts at dialogue in the past seven years, the international community is betting that this time the way will be opened for a negotiated and electoral solution to the complex economic and social crisis that Venezuela is going through, which has unleashed the migration of six million people in recent years.

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