International

Álvaro Uribe, former president of Colombia, affirms that the trial against him has political motivations

Former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010) said on Wednesday that the trial to which he will be called for the crimes of bribery of witnesses in criminal action and procedural fraud has political motivations and lacks evidence against him.

“This trial is brought forward for political presumptions, for personal deception, for political revenge, without evidence to infer that I sought to bribe witnesses or deceive justice,” Uribe said in a statement read on his social networks.

The Prosecutor’s Office yesterday made an accusation against Uribe “as an alleged determiner of the crimes of bribery of witnesses in criminal proceedings and procedural fraud,” in a case that began in 2012 with a complaint against the left-wing senator Iván Cepeda and that, like a boomerang, was returned against him.

Uribe denied that he knew or had had contacts with several criminals cited in the process, some of them prisoners, whom lawyer Diego Cadena allegedly contacted to testify against Cepeda.

“I always asked for the truth, I never asked to lie or shut up,” said the former president and leader of the right-wing party Centro Democrático, who added: “I have never involved people in crime, except people of my children’s age.”

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Uribe’s lawsuit against Cepeda, a senator who today is part of the ruling coalition Historical Pact, sought to demonstrate an alleged manipulation of witnesses in a complaint that he prepared 14 years ago in Congress against the former president for alleged links with paramilitarism.

However, the Supreme Court of Justice decided not to open an investigation against Cepeda and, instead, initiated a lawsuit against Uribe for manipulation of witnesses for alleged payments and offers to two prisoners to testify against the left-wing senator.

For that reason, Uribe questioned the actions of the Supreme Court, in particular of magistrates José Luis Barceló, Luis Hernández and César Reyes, some of whom he said that they have some kind of personal or work bond with their political enemies.

“What a difference in treatment; my accusers are allowed of everything and they accuse me without evidence for bribery of witnesses and deception of justice,” he added.

Uribe resigned in August 2020 from the Senate to stop being assed and that his case passed to ordinary Justice and then the Prosecutor’s Office, led at the time by Francisco Barbosa, a friend of the then Uribe president Iván Duque, decided that there was no evidence to prosecute him judicially.

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The accusation against Uribe to take him to trial comes two weeks after the new attorney general, Luz Adriana Camargo, took office, which allowed the process to be unlocked, something in which Uribe also sees signs of animosity against him.

“The new attorney general of the nation has worked very close to the Minister of Defense (Iván Velásquez), it was his second in the (UN) mission in Guatemala, which I criticized. For no one is the Minister’s animosity against my family and towards me,” he said.

For Uribe, in this case the political origin of the process against him has become clear, which even linked him to the peace negotiations with the illegal armed groups, of which he has been a severe opponent.

“This manipulation against me gives signs of being part of the motivation to be part of a total peace agreement or for an end point law. So that they forgive the criminals as they did with the FARC and justify it with the fiction of forgiving those of us who have not committed crimes,” he said.

The former president also accused magistrates of the case of depriving him of the right to defend his honor because “if I do it bribe to witnesses and bribery to justice” and assured that “all the new evidence” carried out after the previous Prosecutor’s Office asked on two occasions for the closure of his case favor him, “however they dismissed them.”

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“They open the doors of the prison for me without proof, with the evidence on the contrary, for assumptions, political spirits and the need to equalize those who have not committed crimes with those who have done it,” he concluded.

International

Trump urges Putin to reach peace deal

On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his desire for Russian President Vladimir Putin to “reach a deal” to end the war in Ukraine, while also reaffirming his willingness to impose sanctions on Russia.

“I want to see him reach an agreement to prevent Russian, Ukrainian, and other people from dying,” Trump stated during a press conference in the Oval Office at the White House.

“I think he will. I don’t want to have to impose secondary tariffs on Russian oil,” the Republican leader added, recalling that he had already taken similar measures against Venezuela by sanctioning buyers of the South American country’s crude oil.

Trump also reiterated his frustration over Ukraine’s resistance to an agreement that would allow the United States to exploit natural resources in the country—a condition he set in negotiations to end the war.

International

Deportation flight lands in Venezuela; government denies criminal gang links

A flight carrying 175 Venezuelan migrants deported from the United States arrived in Caracas on Sunday. This marks the third group to return since repatriation flights resumed a week ago, and among them is an alleged member of a criminal organization, according to Venezuelan authorities.

Unlike previous flights operated by the Venezuelan state airline Conviasa, this time, an aircraft from the U.S. airline Eastern landed at Maiquetía Airport, on the outskirts of Caracas, shortly after 2:00 p.m. with the deportees.

Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, who welcomed the returnees at the airport, stated that the 175 repatriated individuals were coming back “after being subjected, like all Venezuelans, to persecution” and dismissed claims that they belonged to the criminal organization El Tren de Aragua.

However, Cabello confirmed that “for the first time in these flights we have been carrying out, someone of significance wanted by Venezuelan justice has arrived, and he is not from El Tren de Aragua.” Instead, he belongs to a gang operating in the state of Trujillo. The minister did not disclose the individual’s identity or provide details on where he would be taken.

International

Son of journalist José Rubén Zamora condemns father’s return to prison as “illegal”

Guatemalan court decides Wednesday whether to convict journalist José Rubén Zamora

The son of renowned journalist José Rubén Zamora Marroquín, José Carlos Zamora, has denounced as “illegal” the court order that sent his father back to a Guatemalan prison on March 3, after already spending 819 days behind barsover a highly irregular money laundering case.

“My father’s return to prison was based on an arbitrary and illegal ruling. It is also alarming that the judge who had granted him house arrest received threats,” José Carlos Zamora told EFE in an interview on Saturday.

The 67-year-old journalist was sent back to prison inside the Mariscal Zavala military barracks on March 3, when Judge Erick García upheld a Court of Appeals ruling that overturned the house arrest granted to him in October. Zamora had already spent 819 days in prison over an alleged money laundering case.

His son condemned the situation as “unacceptable”, stating that the judge handling the case “cannot do his job in accordance with the law due to threats against his life.”