Venezuelan opposition leader Manuel Rosales sought asylum in Peru on Tuesday, claiming he was being persecuted by the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on baseless corruption charges.
Rosales, who ran against Chavez for president in 2006, is former governor of the oil-rich state of Zulia and current mayor of the western Venezuelan city of Maracaibo.
Rosales’ attorney, Peruvian legislator Javier Valle Riestra, said the asylum request was presented to local authorities at midday.
“Now all that is left is to wait for the answer from the Peruvian government, which has two months to decide,” Valle Riesta said.
Valle Riestra — himself a prominent legislator with the ruling APRA party and briefly prime minister in the 1990s — said that granting Rosales asylum should not be considered a move by Peru against Chavez.
“If he is granted asylum ... that does not mean that Chavez is being considered as a gorilla, a thug or a despot,” Valle Riestra said.
Rosales has been hiding from Venezuelan authorities for the past month after the corruption charges were filed.
An outspoken Chavez critic, Rosales ran afoul of the leftist president after he was linked to a 2002 attempted coup against the Venezuelan leader.
Chavez accused Rosales on the campaign trail for regional elections in October of plotting to assassinate him and threatened to have him jailed.
Chavez, who first took office in 1999 and survived the 47-hour coup in 2002, routinely accuses the opposition — and the US government — of trying to overthrow him and even have him killed.
In Venezuela, Interior Minister Tarek El Aissami said on Tuesday that authorities were seeking Rosales’ arrest on charges of illicit enrichment linked to the period he was Zulia governor between 2002 and 2004.
“If he does not present himself to the relevant authorities,” El Aissami told reporters, Rosales “will be considered a fugitive of justice and the mechanisms for his international capture will be activated.”
El Aissami insists that Rosales is not being politically persecuted.
“He is wanted by Venezuelan justice for crimes of corruption” unrelated to politics, he said.
Rosales faces between three and 10 years in prison if found guilty of corruption.
The Maracaibo mayor was supposed to appear in a Caracas court on Monday to determine if he would be jailed pending trial. A new hearing on preventive detention was set for May 11, a member of Rosales’ defense team said.
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a
Packed crowds in India celebrating their cricket team’s victory ended in a deadly stampede on Wednesday, with 11 mainly young fans crushed to death, the local state’s chief minister said. Joyous cricket fans had come out to celebrate and welcome home their heroes, Royal Challengers Bengaluru, after they beat Punjab Kings in a roller-coaster Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket final on Tuesday night. However, the euphoria of the vast crowds in the southern tech city of Bengaluru ended in disaster, with Indian Prime Minister Narendra calling it “absolutely heartrending.” Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said most of the deceased are young, with 11 dead
RSS