The Government has shown serious difficulties in coming to terms with being questioned about the visit of the Venezuelan vice president Delcy Rodriguez to Spain in January 2020 and the meeting he held at the Madrid Barajas airport with the then Minister of Transport, José Luis Ábalostoday on the brink of indictment for his alleged involvement in the Koldo case.
Faced with the new considerations, the newspaper archive uncovers other contradictions regarding the normalization of the figure of Delcy Rodríguez, since the Government came to believe that it could meet with “sanctioned persons”, despite the fact that Moncloa has now distanced itself from the “private” meeting between Ábalos and Rodríguez, and places all responsibility on whoever was one of the key pieces of the Sánchez Government.
Specifically, in April 2021, months after the controversial meeting between the former socialist minister and Maduro’s number two, the Government expressed in a response to the PP to a written question that “the sanctions of the European Union – which have the support of Spain – do not contemplate the prohibition of meetings with sanctioned people. The popular ones asked for the opinion of the Executive about whether it was considered appropriate for a person sanctioned by the European Union, such as Delcy Rodríguez, to participate in the Ibero-American Summit in Andorra on those dates.
Although its intervention was telematic, the Government defended the possibility of meeting with the Venezuelan vice president and highlighted that, in “the Decision and Regulation of the European Union that regulate this matter, the possibility of establishing exceptions to some of the prohibitions included in the pertinent sanctions on those occasions in which it is attempted to facilitate contacts aimed at finding solutions to the crisis.”
The new report of the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard, sent to the judge of the National Court investigating the plot of the collection of commissions in the purchase of masks at the beginning of the pandemic, calls into question the different versions that the Executive, led by Pedro Sánchez, gave more than four years ago, when this issue came to the fore.
It should be remembered that the visit was not only controversial because it was a member of the Nicolás Maduro regime, since Rodríguez has been prohibited from setting foot on European soil since 2018. The Venezuelan leader was included in the sanctioned list of this country because she understood that “she has undermined democracy and the rule of law in Venezuela, including the usurpation of powers of the National Assembly and its use to attack the opposition and prevent them from forming part of the political process”, as established by a resolution of the Council of the European Union.
Faced with the argument that “Ábalos did his duty, which was to avoid a diplomatic crisis with his intervention” by trying to prevent Rodríguez from getting off the plane and setting foot on Spanish soil, as Sánchez defended in Congress on February 12, 2020 and later reiterated On other occasions, both in the Lower House and the Senate, the UCO notes that Rodríguez’s visit was not a surprise: Ábalos notified him four days in advance and Sánchez gave him the go-ahead.
“To finish bothering you, the vice president of Venezuela comes in private trip next monday and he wants to see me discreetly. The management that we agreed with Spanish companies has allowed Duro Felguera to collect a significant debt,” Ábalos announced in a list of tasks sent to Sánchez by WhatsApp, to which the President of the Government responded with a “good.” However, once this unprecedented conversation emerged, Sánchez himself on Friday downplayed the importance of the Government’s management in the “do not travel.”
“Ábalos informed me of this private visit by Vice President Delcy Rodríguez to Spain and when the Government of Spain realized that there were individual sanctions against the Vice President of Venezuela, That visit was actually canceled.“Sanchez added from Rome. In fact, in Moncloa they suggest that the leader of the Executive was deceived by the former head of Transport, unexpectedly replaced in the Government remodeling of July 2021.
But before Ábalos stopped being an indispensable figure for Sánchez both in the Government and in the PSOE (as Secretary of Organization of the party), the socialist leader had stood up for the former minister, despite the fact that he came to give different versions about the meeting. At first, he denied that he was going to the Barajas Airport to receive Delcy Rodríguez because the person he was going to receive was his close “friend.” Felix PlasenciaVenezuelan Minister of Tourism.
Although he said that he did not greet the leader of the Chavista regime, he later explained that he had greeted her, but in a quick and protocol manner. Also, he was the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaskawho sent her with the mission of not making her get off the plane. Later, he admitted that he met her inside the plane, although he did get off the aircraft, but without stepping on Spanish soil, since the Barajas VIP roomwhere the Venezuelan vice president supposedly spent the night after landing at the international airport, is not a community space.
Beyond painting this action as a kind of diplomatic missionthe UCO report reveals that there was an intention of the Government to meet with the number two of the Maduro Executive, although the armed institute unit has not been able to verify that Duro Felguera will collect the alleged debt to which the former minister refers in his message to the President of the Government.
It is the case that the Venezuelan leader appears in another passage of the UCO report, in which she relates that the commission agent of the plot, Victor de Aldama“had a direct relationship” with Delcy Rodríguez, with whom he negotiated the purchase and sale of 104 gold bars for 68 million dollars. And these conversations took place in the days before the vice president’s controversial visit to Spain, orchestrated by Aldama. The commission agent “would have used the highest levels of MITMA (Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda) to organize this trip,” according to the UCO.
After Sánchez gave the okÁbalos sent the capture of the conversation to Koldo García, who replied “How much I love you”to which the former Minister of Transport replied: “You see he hasn’t told me anything, but at least no problems”. Days later, Koldo, Aldama and Ábalos received the leader of Venezuela at the Barajas Airport, a “private” meeting for which, according to Moncloa, Ábalos will have to be held accountable. Far from the support of the Government to whom he was once part of it, Sánchez officially distanced himself from Ábalos this Friday and promised that “there will be no impunity” if cases of corruption within his Executive are confirmed.