As of Monday, the Sun Cartel became a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) for the United States. Your Foreign Ministry This organization is linked to the leadership of the army and the government Venezuelans. According to Washington, the President of Venezuela is the alleged leader of this cartel.
In this way, Nicolas Maduro has now been identified, enabling the United States, in accordance with his actions, to initiate covert counterterrorism operations against him and his leadership, and to attack Venezuelan assets and infrastructure. Donald Trump was asked about this matter and the US President replied: “It allows us to do it, but we didn’t say we were going to do it.”
Terrorist organization
Until 2025, the White House reserves the foreign terrorist organization designation for groups that use violence for political purposes, such as the Islamic State or Al Qaeda. In February of this year, the Trump administration It has been applied to eight criminal organizations in Latin America Involved in drug trafficking, migrant smuggling and other activities.
The United States asserts that Maduro and senior officials and soldiers in his executive government are leading the Sun Cartel. American officials accused this group of He collaborated with the Venezuelan band Tren de AraguaWhich Washington has already classified as a terrorist organization. According to this theory, the two organizations would send Colombian drugs to the United States. Colombia is the world’s leading producer of cocaine.
US government He blames this cartel for operating the ships it attacks, but rarely identifies them To the organizations and did not provide evidence. It claims that the attacks, which began off the coast of Venezuela and then spread to the eastern Pacific Ocean, were aimed at stopping the flow of drugs into American cities.
Aragua and Sinaloa train
The White House insists that Maduro leads the “Soles Cartel” and provides material support to Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua and Sinaloa cartels. The Venezuelan president denies everything. This year, the US Department of Justice doubled the reward for information leading to the arrest of the Venezuelan leader to $50 million.
According to the US Treasury Department, Tren de Aragua is a terrorist organization born in Venezuela. “She is involved in illicit drug trafficking, human trafficking, extortion, sexual exploitation of women and children and money laundering, among other criminal activities,” they say.
he The Sinaloa Cartel is one of the oldest and most powerful cartels From Mexico, “responsible for a significant portion of the trafficking of deadly drugs into the United States from Mexico. In addition to the smuggling of fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and other illicit drugs into the United States, the Sinaloa Cartel is involved in widespread violence.”
Since 1990, with Chavez and Maduro
The term Cartel de los Soles came into use in Venezuela in the 1990s. This is indicated High-ranking military officers enriched themselves through drug trafficking. The cartel’s name refers to the epaulettes worn on the uniforms of high-ranking officers.
As corruption spread throughout the country, its use was loosely extended to police and government officials, as well Activities such as illegal mining and fuel smuggling. This happened first under the presidency of Hugo Chávez and then under the presidency of Maduro.
The name became popular and was used frequently, especially starting in the mid-2000s, when many of the members were different Branches of the military took on more active roles in drug traffickingas InsightCrime noted in a recent report. In March 2020, the umbrella term was elevated to a drug trafficking organization led by Maduro.
Then US Attorney General William Barr announced the filing of criminal drug trafficking charges against the President of Venezuela. Indeed after that, Washington considered Maduro the leader of a drug cartel in cooperation with the Colombian rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), before they laid down their arms in 2016).
A group without hierarchy
This accusation also referred, among others, to the Minister of the Interior, Diosdado Cabello, and the Minister of Defense, Vladimir Padrino López. According to the US Treasury Department, all of them “corrupted Venezuelan government institutions, including… Parts of the army, intelligence services, legislative and judicial branchesTo facilitate drug smuggling into the United States.
“They are designating something that is not a terrorist organization.”
Prior to the peace agreement, members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia regularly used the porous border region with Venezuela as a haven and operations center for cocaine shipments destined for the United States. According to Washington, this happened often With the support or at least the approval of the security forces Venezuelans. The Colombian guerrilla, the National Liberation Army, is also involved in illicit trafficking.
But the Souls Cartel is not a classic cartel, like the Sinaloa Cartel, for example. It’s actually about A decentralized network of Venezuelan groups Within the armed forces. “It’s not a group that people identify themselves as members of,” Adam Isaacson, director of defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, told the AP. “They don’t have regular meetings. They don’t have a hierarchy.”
But does it exist as an organization?
This alleged cartelIt’s not a traditional drug trafficking organization, “It’s organized vertically,” says Jeremy McDermott of InsightCrime. According to the co-founder and co-director of this institution dedicated to the study and research of security threats, Suns are “usually a series of cells OfflineAnd integrated into the Venezuelan army.
“Cartel de los Soles is a invented name for an improvised group of officials involved in drug trafficking.”
Due to its lack of hierarchy and structure, some claim it cannot be compared to traditional groups designated as terrorist organizations by the United States, such as Sinaloa. Others suggest it’s technically so The Suns Cartel does not exist in the traditional sense. “They classify something that is not a terrorist organization as a terrorist organization,” he asserts. CNN News Former Foreign Office lawyer Brian Finucane.
A former senior US administration official told that TV channel that the Souls cartel was “a.k.a An invented name to describe an improvised group Of Venezuelan officials involved in drug smuggling through Venezuela. “It lacks the hierarchy and command-and-control structure that a traditional cartel has.” This official claims that the Trump administration relies on “misinformation.”