The policy of "maximum pressure" which has become the line of Washington vis-à-vis its most irreducible adversaries, took a new step, Thursday, March 26, in Washington.
The Justice Department has announced prosecutions against the strongman of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, and a circle of his relatives, accused of drug trafficking. The United States has demanded his departure since January 2019, when it recognized opponent Juan Guaido as the country's interim president.
Charges announced Thursday include bonuses paid to who will provide "Information leading to the arrest and / or conviction of the Venezuelan official". His head is priced for 15 million dollars (13.5 million euros), sums of 10 million dollars and 5 million dollars are offered for his subordinates.
The names of the charges against the president currently in office in Caracas may be surprising. New York South District attorney Geoffrey Berman accuses him of having "Led, with its main lieutenants, a narcoterrorism partnership" with the former Colombian guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) "In the past twenty years". According to American justice, he personally led a mafia group, the "Cartel of Suns", behind the shipment of thousands of tonnes of drugs to the United States, including via Honduras.
"Maduro used cocaine as a weapon"
According to the prosecutor, "Maduro and the other accused", also accused of plundering Venezuelan resources, "Expressly intended to flood the United States with cocaine in order to harm the health and well-being of our nation." "Maduro deliberately used cocaine as a weapon", assures Mr. Berman.
Florida prosecutor Ariana Fajardo Orshan has also blamed money laundering from this traffic in the Miami property boom.
These charges mark a break with the line adopted by Washington after the recognition of Juan Guaido as the legitimate president of Venezuela. At the time, as in the months that followed, the American authorities were betting on international pressure which would provoke the voluntary departure of Nicolas Maduro. "We want him to have a dignified outing and go away", In August 2019, the State Department’s special envoy for this Latin American country, Elliott Abrams, still estimated. "We don't want to take you to court, we don't want to persecute you, we want you to leave power", added the latter to the attention of the Venezuelan leader.
