Notice of no-impunity to heads of narco-states in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and elsewhere

(Interamerican Institute for Democracy) The sentencing of former President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, by a federal jury of the United States for “three charges that included crimes of importation of cocaine and weapons” and the indictment that “he abused his position as the President of Honduras to operate the country as a narco-State” is a historical milestone warning there will be no impunity for the heads and operators of Latin America’s narco-States, and applies to the wielders of power in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua and governors of states or provinces in federal countries.

In a press release this past 8th of March, the Department of Justice (DOJ) from the United States announced that “Hernandez was found guilty of three charges; i) conspiracy to import cocaine to the United States, that entails a minimum mandatory sentence of 10 years of incarceration and a maximum sentence imprisonment for life; ii) possession and use of machineguns and destructive devices during the conspiracy to import the cocaine, as well as the possession of machineguns to promote said conspiracy, which entails a sentence of a mandatory consecutive incarceration for 30 years; and iii) conspiracy to carry and use machineguns and other destructive devices during the conspiracy to import cocaine, and the possession of machine guns in support of the same, entailing a maximum sentence of life in prison”

The U.S. Attorney General, Merrick B. Garland, stated “Juan Orlando Hernandez abused his position as President of Honduras to run the country as a narco-State wherein violent narcotics’ traffickers were allowed to operate with virtual impunity and the peoples from Honduras and the United States were forced to suffer the consequences.”

Federal Prosecutor Damian Williams from the Southern District Court of New York said “Juan Orlando Hernandez had all the opportunities to be a force for the common good of his native Honduras, but instead he chose to abuse his position and his country for his own personal benefit and associated himself with some of the biggest and most violent narcotics trafficker organizations of the world to transport tons of cocaine into the United States.”

The warning that there will be no impunity for heads of narco-States in the region has been cast by this same Federal Prosecutor from New York who said: “I sincerely hope this sentence sends a message to corrupt politicians considering doing something similar; to elect wisely. My office will not stop at anything to investigate and prosecute those responsible of sending poison to this community, without regard of their status or political power.”

Narco-States are “those countries whose political institutions are influenced -in an important way- by the power and wealth of narcotics’ trafficking and whose leaders simultaneously are government officials and members of illicit narcotics’ trafficking networks, sheltered and protected by their lawful empowerment.”

Given the proved criminal alliance of Fidel Castro with Colombian Pablo Escobar Gaviria and Bolivian Roberto Suarez Gomez, to traffic drugs into the United States, Cuba’s dictatorship was -without a doubt- the first narco-State in Latin America. Something that that neither ended, nor was concealed, by the execution by firing squad of General Arnaldo Ochoa, Colonel Antonio de la Guardia, and other officers. This was a permanent enterprise with the organization, support, and protection of narco-subversive groups of the FARC, ELN, and others in Colombia and the Coca-Leaf Harvester Federations of Evo Morales in Bolivia, the Armies of National Liberation ELN throughout the region, the Shining Path and the MRTA in Peru and more. The entire Castroist guerrillas labeled as “revolutionary” was based on narcotics’ trafficking.

In this 21st century, Cuba is the narco-State-In-Chief and installed as narco-States the dictatorships from; Venezuela with Chavez and now with Maduro (with a $15M bounty for his capture), Bolivia with Evo Morales and Luis Arce Catacora, Nicaragua with Ortega and Murillo. The participation of 21st Century Socialism’s wielders of power ranges from a direct implication in narcotics’ trafficking to the public proclamation -by States under its control- of the fallacy that “the war on drugs has failed” and the “legalization of drugs” to become from Narcos to entrepreneurs.

Just as grievous and dangerous as the narco-States from Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua, are the narco-States within federal countries as publicly denounced in Mexico’s Michoacan, Guerrero, Zacatecas, etc., and in Argentina’s Santiago del Estero, identified as the “aircraft carrier of drugs,” Formosa, and elsewhere.

Twenty-First Century Socialism and its feudal expressions in federal States of Latin America are the reality that finances the sustainment, expansion, and influence of dictatorships

Castrochavism dictators remember that old Spanish adage that says “when you see your neighbor shaving his beard, soak your own one” or that old English proverb that says “Every thought is a cause & every condition is an effect. Change your thoughts & you change your destiny.”

*Attorney & Political Scientist. Director of the Interamerican Institute for Democracy.

Translation from Spanish by Edgar L. Terrazas