VenEconomy: Is Resolution No. 008610 a Cover for Venezuela’s Drug Cartels?

From the Editors of VenEconomy

Venezuela seems not only resting upon an erupting volcano, but violently hit by a hurricane at the same time, even though the country doesn’t have any volcanoes or is a tornado area. The alarming and inexplicable events here happen so fast that is hard for anyone to get the chance to digest and analyze their implications.

On Wednesday, for example, the national and international public opinion was surprised with a report by Spain-based newspaper ABC talking about the defection of Leamsy Salazar Villafaña, a lieutenant commander and former head of security of the late Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro, who had allegedly requested asylum in the U.S. and would be testifying as a protected witness of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

The scandal was made viral by the social networks and the media because of the size of the disclosures Salazar Villafaña would be supposedly making at the DEA on the penetration of drug organizations into the Venezuelan government, directly involving Diosdado Cabello, the head of the Parliament and the ruling party PSUV and, according to the lieutenant commander, the famed "Cartel of the Suns" and its operations of international drug trafficking.

This story is still in full development and no one knows where it will lead. And there is no official confirmation of any U.S. authority that Salazar Villafaña is a protected witness of the DEA so far. What is indeed a fact is that some Venezuelan government officials, such as lawmaker Pedro Carreño, have publicly acknowledged the defection of Salazar Villafaña and that Cabello already announced legal action against ABC and other local newspapers that picked up the story, including El Nacional and TalCual.

The next day, as Venezuelans remained lost in amazement, the independent media, social networks and international press reported another serious complaint from constitutional lawyers and representatives of local Human Rights NGOs: the Resolution No. 008610 from the Ministry of Defense, published in the Official Gazette on January 27, authorizing in its article 22, paragraph 7, that military officers can intervene in demonstrations and use "potentially deadly force that might as well be firearms or another life-threatening weapon," as a last resort to "avoid disturbances, support the legitimately constituted authority and reject any aggression by repelling it immediately with the necessary resources." 

This resolution caused panic among citizens living today amid a climate of social tensions, food shortages, high inflation, rampant insecurity, human rights violations, and a loss of basic civil and political freedoms.

Various specialists in the field have expressed their concern over the implications and consequences of this resolution.

One of them is Rocío San Miguel, a human rights lawyer who said that even though the resolution has positive aspects, it also contains some dangerous inaccuracies with respect to the use of deadly force or firearms. Not only is this prohibited during peaceful demonstrations, she says, but the use of "deadly force" within the Armed Forces, overall, is for specific cases "under very precise and restrictive rules," something that lacks this resolution. 

Furthermore, this resolution constitutes a violation of the new National Constitution, which stipulates that the National Guard is the military component responsible for the security of citizens, thus taking an additional step forward in strengthening the militarization of the country. 

The reality is that Resolution No. 008610 adds a new ingredient to the menu of violence and repression served to the population by the so-called "peaceful-but-armed revolution" that Chávez had once boasted about and where authorities can end up "shooting first and asking questions later."

VenEconomy has been a leading provider of consultancy on financial, political and economic data in Venezuela since 1982.