Venezuelan Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello on his TV program Con El Mazo Dando. Photo: Con el Mazo Dando.
Venezuela’s Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello rejected the claims of Washington and the Venezuelan far-right opposition about alleged connections of the 190 Venezuelan migrants repatriated from the United States with the criminal gang Tren de Aragua. On Wednesday, February 12, on his television program Con el Mazo Dando, Cabello stressed that none of the 190 repatriates have any connection with the criminal gang and, in fact, the great majority of them have no criminal records at all.
Cabello said that the migrants who returned last Monday were received in Venezuela with “an embrace of solidarity, which is not denied to any Venezuelan wherever they are and in whatever situation they may be in.” He also reported that many of these repatriated Venezuelans requested family reunification measures as many were separated from their partners and children and they remain in the United States.
Minister Cabello added, “Those who criticize us now have done nothing for the migrants except criticize them and say that they are all from Tren de Aragua, and I repeat, of those 190 who arrived, none had any links with that criminal gang. Of the 190, 17 have pending cases with the Venezuelan judiciary, and they were separated from the rest.”
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Cabello added, “These companions arrived full of hope of starting over with their families, many of them thanked us for getting them out of hell.”
He also reported that Venezuelan authorities dismantled a gang that even had stolen seals from public institutions and security agencies that negotiated the sale of false documents that “confirmed prosecutions for some crime and even arrest warrants…for sale.” The false documents were used by the migrant trafficking gangs (coyotes) to facilitate asylum seeking paperwork in various countries.
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Finally, he stated that “when the repatriates arrived here, we already knew the condition of each one and now they are being treated. Some came down in wheelchairs or with injuries and we treated them, so now the opposition is claiming that we brought them back in handcuffs. Who are they harming? The Revolution? No, they cannot harm the Revolution.”
(RedRadioVE) by Victoria Torres, with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/SC
