Since the Special Prosecutor Against Impunity (FECI) reported on Tuesday that it will take action against the Colombian Defense Minister, Iván Velásquez, and accused him of endorsing illegal agreements in the Odebrecht casethe tension between the two countries has not been long in coming.
While Colombian President Gustavo Petro fully defended the official who is part of his cabinet, to the point of calling his ambassador for consultation, and assured that he will not accept an arrest warrant against him; His Guatemalan counterpart, Alejandro Giammatei, has maintained that his counterpart is making a mistake and has also called his ambassador to Colombia for consultation.
The voice of america He tells him who Velásquez is and what relationship he has with the Central American country.
Who is Ivan Velasquez?
The current head of the Colombian Defense portfolio was born in Medellín. He is a lawyer. He held the position of Departmental Attorney of Antioquia and Judicial Attorney in his hometown. He was an assistant magistrate in the Council of State, and regional director of Prosecutors in Medellín. He was also an assistant magistrate of the Criminal Chamber of the Colombian Supreme Court.
From 2006 to August 2012, he coordinated the Investigative Support Commission, in charge of investigating the relations between members of the Congress of the Republic and the paramilitaries, from where he managed to convict the congressmen involved in the so-called “parapolitics”.
He was the man in charge of investigating the links of former president Álvaro Uribe with the paramilitaries and who denounced the links of Mario Uribe, cousin of the former president, with this armed organization.
Velásquez led, during the nineties, investigations against Pablo Escobar.
In 2011, he received the World Human Rights Award from the International Bar Association (IBA). In 2013, Velásquez Gómez joined the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), at the level of Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations.
In 2018, he was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize.
What relationship does it have with Guatemala?
The CICIG was created, between the government of Guatemala and the UN, to investigate cases of corruption in the Central American country between 2013 and 2017.
Velásquez arrived at CICIG in October 2013. The Minister of Defense was in charge of investigating the Odebrecht network in Guatemala, where it was shown that there were payments for awarding highway construction contracts, events in which officials, among other things, were involved. , the former Minister of Communications of Guatemala, Alejandro Sinibaldi, and the former presidential candidate, Manuel Antonio Baldizón.
In April 2015, the CICIG published the investigation of the The Line casewhich pointed out how importers bribed processors, including government officials, to pay less taxes, through a telephone line that was later intercepted for investigation.
Vice President Roxana Baldetti Elías was forced to resign in May 2015. Velásquez also managed to the fall of former president Otto Pérez Molina for corrupt acts.
In September 2018, the then president of Guatemala, Jimmy Morales announced that would not renew the CICIG mandatewhich expired in 2019, and Guatemala prohibited the entry of Velásquez, the head of the Commission at that time, and He refused to renew his visa.
The decision was made by the then president of Guatemala, Jimmy Morales, days after announcing that he would not renew the CICIG’s mandate, which expired in 2019, for “sowing judicial terror, carrying out biased and partisan investigations, and violating local and international laws.” international”.
What are they accusing him of?
Prosecutor Rafael Curruchinche accuses Velásquez of allowing the approval of several “anomalous” cooperation agreements, within the investigations of the Odebrecht case and of having been associated with two executives of the Brazilian construction company in 2017, which would have bribed high-ranking officials in Guatemala.
What has Velásquez said about the accusations against him?
Velasquez issued a release in which he indicated that he had not “notified any requirement by the Guatemalan authorities” and assured that he had “the peace of mind that the work carried out in the Central American country was carried out with total transparency and within the legal framework that protected the operation of the Commission”.
The minister also thanked President Petro for his support. “We know the monster, we have seen it up close and, from different trenches, we have fought it. We know how it transforms and the methods it uses, but it does not scare us,” he added, via Twitter.
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