Retired general and indicted in the US assures that the Venezuelan government delivered weapons to the FARC

The retired general of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces of Venezuela Clíver Alcalá assured that the Venezuelan government you provided heavy weapons to the extinct Colombian FARC guerrilla.

The transcript of the hearing, which took place on June 30 and was posted Wednesday by journalist Joshua Goodman on Twitter, notes that Alcalá testified that then-President Hugo Chávez Frías provided material – including 20 grenades and two grenade launchers. Iván Márquez and Rodrigo Londoño Echeverri, alias ‘Timochenko’, both members of the FARC.

“First, beginning in 2006, while you were a general in the Bolivarian National Armed Forces of Venezuela, you provided support to the FARC. Is this a true statement?” questioned the prosecution. In this regard, Alcalá responded affirmatively.

Likewise, he assured that he had delivered 20 grenades and two grenade launchers to the FARC. “Both destined for Luciano Marín Arango?” Picks up the text. “Half for Mr. Luciano Marín Arango, and the other half for Mr. Londoño, Timochenko. They were number one and number two of the FARC in the territory that corresponded to me in Venezuela,” was his response, according to the transcript of the audience in New York.

In his statement, the former officer also maintained that Colombian guerrillas were protected from Venezuela.

Last week, the Venezuelan pleaded guilty of US charges of aiding the rebel group.

“General Alcalá accepted a widely negotiated plea deal in which he pleaded guilty to lesser crimes not contained in the indictment against him: providing material support to the FARC when he was a Venezuelan general. This resolution does not include any narcotics crimes” , Alcalá’s defense team reported in a statement.

The general retired from the Venezuelan Army in 2013 and surrendered to US authorities in Colombia, in March 2020, after being accused, together with President Nicolás Maduro, among other collaborators, of being involved in drug trafficking, money laundering and terrorism.

Maduro, for his part, has rejected criticism of his government by the United States and has indicated that it is a plot to remove him from power and take control of oil reserves.

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