Spanish Judge Accuses Venezuelan Gov’t of Aiding Terrorism

A Spanish High Court judge has accused Hugo Chavez’s Venezuelan government of aiding terrorist organizations.
Spanish Judge Accuses Venezuelan Gov’t of Aiding Terrorism
(Benoit Peyrucq/AFP/Getty Images)
3/8/2010
Updated:
10/1/2015
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 (Benoit Peyrucq/AFP/Getty Images)
CARACAS, Venezuela—A Spanish High Court judge has accused Hugo Chavez’s Venezuelan government of aiding terrorist organizations.

Judge Eloy Velasco concluded that the government of Venezuela had helped facilitate collaborations between Basque separatist rebels ETA and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), both of which are considered terrorist organizations.

The terrorist groups had been plotting to assassinate several Colombian politicians, among them, the current president Alvaro Uribe, according to Spanish judiciary sources.

Judge Velasco issued a 26-page bill of indictment against six alleged members of the ETA and seven alleged FARC members for “the felony of conspiracy to commit terrorist murders.”

In the bill, Velasco says there is sufficient evidence “that exposes the Venezuelan government’s cooperation in the illegal collaboration between FARC and ETA.”

One of the principle members of ETA charged was Arturo Cubillas Fontan. Fontan had been chief of the Venezuelan branch of the ETA since 1999, and during his tenure he helped coordinate relations between the ETA and FARC.

According to testimony from four ex-members of FARC and two Spanish policemen, the ETA provided explosives and weapons training to FARC. In exchange, ETA received urban warfare training in at least six Venezuelan locations between 2003 and 2008.

In 2005, both Fontan and his wife were appointed to positions in Chavez’s government in the agriculture ministry.

The Spanish government has reacted strongly to the accusations. Not long after the news first broke that the Venezuelan government might be implicated with the terrorist organizations, Spanish President José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, was already asking for explanations. Following him, the vice president, minister of defense, minister of internal affairs, and Spain’s opposition Popular Party (PP), all made declarations regarding this matter.

Chavez also gave a strong reaction after the judgment was delivered. “Now a Spanish judge, based on some supposed computers that they took from the murdered Raul Reyes [second in command of the FARC] … accuses me, accuses the government of Venezuela of cooperating with the ETA and FARC,” said Chavez.

“Who facilitated this computer? Uribe’s government? … He is the guilty one, the Colombian government blatantly lies,” Chavez continued. “We are being victims of an attack. The Yankees and all their networks, are trying to sabotage the Community of States that we promoted. This irritates the Yankees.”

Aiming his statements directly at the Spanish president, he added, “If you want to, ask your judge for explanations. I have nothing to explain to you or to anybody on this planet,” Chavez said.

Zapatero’s only reaction to Chavez was to say that he was only “asking the Venezuelan government for information.” The two Spanish ministers and the vice president were more stern requesting “mandatory cooperation” from the Venezuelan government in the case.

“In order to carry out such an investigation we need Venezuela’s cooperation, and I will indeed ask this in an outright way to the Venezuelan government: You have to cooperate with the Spanish justice given the fact that the matter is of grave importance,” said Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba, the minister of Internal Affairs on public television.

The general director of the Spanish police, Francisco Javier Velásquez, is scheduled to travel to Venezuela this week to work with Chavez’s government regarding ETA activities in the country and their relations to the FARC.

Minister of External Affairs Miguel Ángel Moratinos, announced that Velázquez’s trip will happen once the Spanish government clears any doubts about the judge’s charges of cooperation between both terrorist groups and the Venezuelan government.

The ETA is a Spanish terrorist organization that since its creation in 1968, has assassinated over 839 people and bombed several buildings causing the death of many innocent civilians.

The FARC is a guerrilla group which operates in Colombia and its borders. It is responsible for the death of over 7,000 people and the kidnapping of several important Colombian politicians as well as foreign civilians. In 2008, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez asked the international community to consider the FARC a “belligerent group” and does not consider them to be terrorists.