Venezuela:
State Sponsor of Terrorism?
IPT News
February 17, 2017
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 U.S. intelligence
has long considered Tareck El Aissami as a key figure in the global
narcotics trade with ties to Iran. He oversaw massive shipments of drugs
from Venezuela to other countries, including the United States, and issued
identification documents to Hizballah operatives. But El Aissami isn't an
affiliate of Hizballah or the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC). El
Aissami is the vice president of Venezuela.
After an extensive Treasury Department investigation spanning several
years, the Trump administration levied sanctions against El Aissami on Monday, freezing his
assets in the United States and prohibiting business relationships with
him. American officials have previously identified and sanctioned other
senior Venezuelan officials involved in drug trafficking operations with Colombian FARC and close cooperation with Iran's terrorist activities.
U.S. officials previously have criticized Venezuela's failure to
cooperate on global counterterrorism issues. Yet these latest allegations –
surrounding the upper echelons of Venezuela's government – suggest that the
South American country has devolved into a full-blown state sponsor of
terrorism.
Earlier this month, CNN received a 2013 secret intelligence document
from several Latin American countries highlighting ties between El Aissami
and 173 Venezuelan identification cards and passports
issued to people from the Middle East, including Hizballah affiliated
personnel. El Aissami "took charge of issuing, granting visas and
nationalizing citizens from different countries, especially Syrians,
Lebanese, Jordanians, Iranians, and Iraqis," the report shows.
Previous U.S. reports detailed blatant corruption and
vulnerabilities on Venezuela's borders, failing to even conduct basic
biographic screening at various ports of entry. However, the allegations
surrounding El Aissami's operations take these security concerns to a whole
new level. One of the most powerful leaders of a large Western country
stands accused of facilitating terrorist infiltration into other states,
including the United States.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center also suggests that El Aissami served as an interlocutor between Iran and Argentina in
an effort to hide the Islamic Republic's role in coordinating the 1994
Jewish Center bombing in Buenos Aires. Hizballah operatives are widely
believed to be responsible for that attack, which killed 85 people and wounded 300.
Moreover, a Wiesenthal Center representative in South America fears that El
Aissami may encourage the Venezuelan government to adopt formal state
policies based on anti-Semitism.
Under the reign of former President Hugo Chavez, Iran exploited friendly
ties with Venezuela to establish terrorist networks throughout region. Iranian
and Hizballah operatives have cultivated and consolidated
operating bases in South America, especially in the tri-border area
(TBA) of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. With a large Muslim population
featuring significant numbers of Hizballah sympathizers, the terrorist
organization uses this area for recruitment, arms smuggling and drug
trafficking, and logistics planning for terrorist operations.
Hizballah also relies on legitimate businesses and front organizations
in the region, diversifying its terrorist financing profile to generate a
significant portion of its revenues from its Latin American operations.
With Venezuelan help, the terrorist group continues to expand its presence
and consolidate support in other Latin American countries. Hizballah has
even registered
as a political party in a Peruvian region characterized as having that
nation's largest Muslim population.
Yet Venezuelan ties to drug trafficking and terrorists are not limited
to South America. The Treasury Department also revealed that El Aissami
helped coordinate narcotics shipments to drug cartels operating on the U.S.
border, including Mexico's infamous Los Zetas. In 2011, Virginia
prosecutors said that a Lebanese man helped the Mexican Los Zetas drug cartel smuggle of
more than 100 tons of Colombian cocaine. The U.S. Treasury Department
claimed that Hizballah benefitted financially from the criminal network.
Later that year, the United States disrupted an IRGC-led plot in cooperation with a
Mexican drug cartel to assassinate Saudi Arabia's Ambassador to Washington.
The problematic nexus between Iranian-backed operatives – including
Hizballah – and Mexican drug cartels allows terrorists to earn big money to
fuel their violent operations. These connections also enable Hizballah to make inroads into the United States through its
porous border with Mexico.
In a 2011 testimony before a House Homeland Security
subcommittee, Roger F. Noriega, former U.S. ambassador to the
Organization of American States, highlighted the danger posed to
U.S. homeland security from the growing Hizballah presence in Latin
America:
"The more broad implication for U.S. homeland security is
that Hizballah—via Iran and Venezuela—has engaged the United States in an
offensive strategy of asymmetric warfare on our doorstep. It is aiming to
win the mental battle of attrition and the moral battle of
legitimacy—particularly with the youth in Latin America. Unless our
government recognizes and responds to their efforts, our ability to protect
our interests and our homeland will be gradually and dangerously
diminished."
That testimony is as relevant today as it was years ago, foreshadowing
continued cooperation between Iran, its terrorist proxies, and the
government of Venezuela. Now with a vice president who maintains intimate
ties to a variety of violent organizations, Venezuela has transitioned from
a safe haven for nefarious activities to a global state sponsor of
terrorism.
Related Topics: Terror
Financing, Venezuela,
Hizballah,
Tareck
El Aissami, IRGC,
Treasury
Department, terrorist
designations, Buenos
Aires Jewish Center bombing, tri-border
region, border
security, Roger
Noriega, Terror
Financing
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