The last remaining fugitive capo of Colombia’s Norte del Valle drug cartel has been captured in Venezuela and will be extradited to the US, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced on Tuesday.
Carlos Alberto “Beto” Renteria, 65, was arrested on Monday after he traveled to Venezuela’s Margarita Island, Chavez said during a speech. He provided no further details.
The US has offered a US$5 million reward for information leading to the arrest of Renteria, whose cartel is accused in a 2004 US indictment of shipping about 500 tonnes of cocaine to the US beginning in 1990.
Chavez said Renteria could be extradited as soon as yesterday.
Renteria is the second major Colombian drug trafficker wanted by US authorities to be caught in Venezuela within the last month.
Authorities arrested Luis Frank Tello on June 24.
Venezuela has in the more than 11 years since Chavez was first elected president become a major hub for traffickers smuggling Colombian cocaine to the US and Europe.
US and Colombian officials have frequently accused Chavez’s government of lax anti-drug efforts, including allowing Venezuela to become a safe haven for Colombian drug lords.
One senior law enforcement official in Colombia, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the subject’s sensitivity, said Renteria had long been living in Venezuela.
“He is the last of the original Norte del Valle cartel leadership to be captured,” the official said.
Another top Norte del Valle cartel boss, Wilber Varela, spent most of the last five years of his life in Venezuela before he was slain there in January 2008, former Venezuelan anti-drug chief Mildred Camero said.
The Norte del Valle cartel was Colombia’s last major drug gang, though its command structure was far less centrally organized than its forerunners, the Cali and Medellin cartels. It eventually split into two major warring factions, one of which Varela commanded.
Like many fugitive traffickers, Renteria underwent plastic surgery to change his appearance and make it more difficult to identify him, the law enforcement official in Colombia said.
Chavez accuses Washington and Bogota of unfairly labeling his country a drug haven for political reasons, arguing his government is doing everything possible to stem the flow of drugs through Venezuela, but US and Colombian officials say his government’s counter-drug efforts became bullish only in recent months, perhaps because Chavez recognizes what a serious national security threat drug-related corruption can be.
In related news, Venezuela will also hand over to Cuba a Salvadorean man wanted for allegedly carrying out bombings of Cuban tourist hotels in 1997, Chavez said on Tuesday.
Francisco Chavez Abarca was arrested by Venezuelan authorities last Thursday when he arrived at Caracas international airport.
Venezuelan officials said Chavez Abarca was a member of an anti-communist group trained and led by Cuban exile and former CIA operative Luis Posada Carriles, who is also wanted in Cuba and Venezuela on terrorism charges.
Chavez Abarca was detained under an Interpol arrest warrant requested by Cuba and was carrying a false Guatemalan passport, Chavez said.
“In the next few hours, he’ll be sent to Cuba,” Chavez said in comments broadcast by state television.
The Venezuelan leader, a close ally of Cuba’s communist rulers, called Chavez Abarca a “terrorist.”
Venezuelan Interior Minister Tareck El Aissami said last week that Chavez Abarca was accused by Cuban officials of being one of several Central Americans who carried out the 1997 bombings in an operation allegedly masterminded by Posada Carriles, who lives in the US.
Cuba and Venezuela have repeatedly demanded Washington extradite Posada Carriles, whom they also accuse of being behind the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people.
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