HomeNewsBriefVenezuela Blames Sinaloa Cartel for Air France Cocaine Shipment
BRIEF

Venezuela Blames Sinaloa Cartel for Air France Cocaine Shipment

SINALOA CARTEL / 1 SEP 2014 BY JAMES BARGENT EN

Officials in Venezuela have claimed that last year's record cocaine seizure from an Air France flight out of Caracas belonged to Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel, in a statement that -- whether accurate or not -- appears designed to deflect attention away from the Venezuelan security forces.

In his testimony to the special congressional committee set up to investigate last year's Air France trafficking scandal, former Venezuelan anti-drugs chief Brigadier General Alejandro Kerelis said the 1.3 ton cocaine shipment was sent by Sinaloa operatives trying out a new route to Europe, reported El Nacional.

After nearly a year of investigations, the commission has yet to produce a report. One of its members, Ricardo Sanchez, said the body is currently examining two theories, according to El Universal. The first is that the drugs were seized as part of an undercover operation, the second is that the seizure is a "false positive" -- in the sense that the drugs existed but never passed through Venezuela. According to Sanchez, they have received no evidence proving the drugs came off the flight from Venezuela.

According to El Universal, Venezuelan investigators in the case complained the process had been hampered by a lack of information from French officials, who, they claimed, have offered no details on the luggage used or how the shipment was discovered and seized.

InSight Crime Analysis

The claim that a Mexican cartel was behind the now-notorious September 2013 Air France shipment is certainly plausible.

In the past, Colombian traffickers controlled routes through Venezuela, paying off corrupt Venezuelan security officials along the way. However, those corrupt officials began organizing their own networks to take a bigger cut of profits, becoming what is popularly known as the Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Suns), a drug trafficking network of powerful high-ranking military officials. There is evidence to suggest that part of this process involved reaching out to Mexican groups.

SEE ALSO: Cartel of the Suns Profile

However, accurate or not, blaming the shipment on the arguably the biggest and certainly the most famous Latin American drug trafficking operation of them all, the Sinaloa Cartel, makes for a convenient distraction from the role of Venezuela's military, which manages airport security, and the Cartel of the Suns.

The theories expressed by the commission also suggest obfuscation. The idea that the drugs did not come from Venezuela is not credible -- not only would this involve remarkable dishonesty from the French officials, it would also ignore evidence the commission has examined, which included x-rays of the packages taken in Venezuela.

share icon icon icon

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

What are your thoughts? Click here to send InSight Crime your comments.

We encourage readers to copy and distribute our work for non-commercial purposes, with attribution to InSight Crime in the byline and links to the original at both the top and bottom of the article. Check the Creative Commons website for more details of how to share our work, and please send us an email if you use an article.

Was this content helpful?

We want to sustain Latin America’s largest organized crime database, but in order to do so, we need resources.

DONATE

Related Content

MEXICO / 29 JUN 2022

El Chueco has quite the rap sheet, having allegedly killed priests, a tour guide, baseball players and an American tourist.

ARGENTINA / 19 NOV 2021

Once the purview of Mexican drug cartels, the production of pro-gang songs that soothe the egos of powerful criminal overlords…

CONTRABAND / 6 JUL 2023

Illegal mining in Venezuela's Yapacana National Park has produced a parallel contraband economy to grow. And state actors know all…

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Contributes Expertise Across the Board 

22 SEP 2023

This week InSight Crime investigators Sara García and María Fernanda Ramírez led a discussion of the challenges posed by Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” plan within urban contexts. The…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Cited in New Colombia Drug Policy Plan

15 SEP 2023

InSight Crime’s work on emerging coca cultivation in Honduras, Guatemala, and Venezuela was cited in the Colombian government’s…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Discusses Honduran Women's Prison Investigation

8 SEP 2023

Investigators Victoria Dittmar and María Fernanda Ramírez discussed InSight Crime’s recent investigation of a massacre in Honduras’ only women’s prison in a Twitter Spaces event on…

THE ORGANIZATION

Human Trafficking Investigation Published in Leading Mexican Newspaper

1 SEP 2023

Leading Mexican media outlet El Universal featured our most recent investigation, “The Geography of Human Trafficking on the US-Mexico Border,” on the front page of its August 30…

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime's Coverage of Ecuador Leads International Debate

25 AUG 2023

This week, Jeremy McDermott, co-director of InSight Crime, was interviewed by La Sexta, a Spanish television channel, about the situation of extreme violence and insecurity in Ecuador…