Illegal drug trade in Venezuela
Venezuela has been a path to the United States for cocaine originating in Colombia, through Central America and Mexico and Caribbean countries such as Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico.
[1] In 2005 Venezuela severed ties with the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), accusing its representatives of spying.
"[9] In Apure, Colombian guerrilla group FARC had set up locations in the state, creating multiple airfields in the region.
[3][11] At a presentation at the XXXII International Conference on Drugs in 2015, commander of the United States Southern Command General John Kelly stated that though relations with other Latin American nations countering drug trafficking has been good, Venezuela was not as cooperative and that "there's a lot of cocaine leaving Venezuela to the world market".
[12] Since 2012, the United States government has stated that "generally permissive security forces and a corrupt political environment have made Venezuela one of the preferred routes of cocaine trafficking from South America", noting that drug trafficking organizations ranging from Mexican cartels, such as El Tren de Aragua, Los Zetas, Ángeles Caído and the Sinaloa Cartel, to armed far-right Colombian organizations and the FARC and ELN, have operated from Venezuela.
[13] In 2008, the leader of the Colombian Norte del Valle Cartel, Wilber Varela, was found murdered in a hotel in Mérida in Venezuela.
[16] According to Jackson Diehl, Deputy Editorial Page Editor of The Washington Post, the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela shelters "one of the world’s biggest drug cartels".
[19][21][22] The men flew from a hangar reserved for the President of Venezuela in Simón Bolívar International Airport into Haiti while being assisted by Venezuelan military personnel, which included two presidential honor guards, with the nephews carrying Venezuelan diplomatic passports which did not have diplomatic immunity according to former head of DEA international operations Michael Vigil.
[24] The incident happened at a time when multiple high-ranking members of the Venezuelan government were being investigated for their involvement of drug trafficking,[19] including Walter Jacobo Gavidia, Flores' son who is a Caracas judge, as well as Diosdado Cabello and Tarek El Aissami.
[28] In the same year, the Secretary General of the Organization of American States, Jose Miguel Insulza, testified before the U.S. Congress that "there are no evidences [sic]" that Venezuela is supporting "terrorist groups", including the FARC.
[31] In September 2013, an incident involving men from the Venezuelan National Guard placing 31 suitcases containing 1.3 tons of cocaine on a Paris flight astonished French authorities.
[32] According to Colombian weekly Revista Semana, the director of the Dirección General de Inteligencia Militar (DGIM), Venezuelan agency in charge of Military Intelligence, was involved in supporting FARC drug trafficking.
[36] The CIA, in spite of objections from the Drug Enforcement Administration, in 1990 allowed at least one ton of nearly pure cocaine to be shipped into Miami International Airport.
