What will happen after the resignation of the vice president of Paraguay, accused of corruption by the US?

The United States caused the resignation of Paraguay’s vice president, Hugo Velázquez, and forced his retirement from politics after accusing him of “significantly corrupted” Friday in an official statement by Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington. But it also triggered a political earthquake in Asunción, when the campaign for next year’s presidential election has already begun.

Velázquez announced his resignation as soon as he learned of an official communication read by the American ambassador in Asunción, Marc Ostfield.

The vice president also renounced his candidacy for president of the Republic ahead of the general elections on April 30, 2023.

In the primaries of the Colorado Party, scheduled for December 18, for the ruling party supported by President Mario Abdo Benítez, Velázquez had to fight for the candidacy against economist Santiago Peña, the dolphin of former president Horacio Cartes (2013-2018) , Abdo’s tough political enemy.

On July 22, Blinken also announced a similar sanction against former President Cartes, who will no longer be able to enter the United States. Not even any of his three children. According to Washington, Cartes thwarted “a major international investigation into transnational crime”.

The measure was reported as an offshoot of a cargo of cigarettes from his tobacco company that had been transported to the Caribbean island of Aruba in May by the plane hijacked in June in Ezeiza, belonging to the questionable Venezuelan-Iranian company Emtrasur. Cartes spokespersons stressed that there is no partnership – other than commercial, goods – with the company in question.

Confusion in the government

The US sanction collapses the ruling party ahead of the 2023 presidential elections e strengthen the oppositionwhich will be presented under the formula of a coalition, in which veteran politician Efraín Alegre appears as the lead candidate.

Leader of the liberal party, Alegre was already a rival of Cartes in the presidential elections of 2013 and of Mario Abdo in 2018.

“It is a magnificent opportunity for the opposition. We must be smart and united in our strategy to defeat the Colorados in 2023. It has been shown that it is made up of corrupt people,” said Hugo Richer, member of the Frente Guasú (Great Front) led by the former bishop and former president Fernando Lugo (2008-2012).

The Colorado party has dominated Paraguayan politics from power for 76 years, except for the lapse of Lugo’s presidency, who was hospitalized this Friday after suffering a stroke on Wednesday.

The president’s reaction

“I have decided to step aside so as not to influence the environment of the President of the Republic (Mario Abdo Benítez) or the Party of Colorado,” Velázquez visibly expressed remorse on 1080 AM radio.

“I intend to retire from politics. It was the last phase of my career. If it can’t happen, what will we do? They are God’s designs,” he added after being surprised by the news. President Abdo supported him and witnessed his political acts as part of the electoral campaign for the primary.

President Abdo Benítez called his vice president’s decision “ripe” “putting the interests of our nation-building and credibility first in announcing his resignation.”

“Obviously in this circumstance the continuity of the vice president was unacceptable“, he commented after presiding over a public act in the city of the mayor Otaño (400 km south-east).

“Significant acts of corruption”

The State Department sanctioned Velázquez “for his participation in significant acts of corruption, including bribery of a public official and interference in public proceedings”.

Also on the list are his wife and three of his children, as well as Juan Carlos Duarte, current legal advisor to the Yacyretá binational dam, who was promptly fired by the Paraguayan director, former Paraguayan president Nicanor Duarte (2003-2008).

“I have done nothing of what they accuse me of. I speak with a clear conscience”, remarked the vice president. “In the case that concerns me, the accusation is very volatile,” he said.

Washington explained that Duarte “offered a bribe to a Paraguayan public official to obstruct an investigation that threatened the vice president and his financial interests.”

Blinken said Duarte “has abused and exploited his powerful and privileged public position within the Yacyretá Binational Entity, putting public trust in one of Paraguay’s most vital economic resources at risk.”

He stressed that these acts “have influenced the public perception of corruption and impunity” of the vice-presidency of Paraguay.

The sanction implies that the aforementioned and their relatives can no longer enter the United States.

Alleged links with Hezbollah

At the time of the announcement, the local press published a photo released in 2016 in which Velázquez and Duarte appear strolling on a luxury yacht along the Beirut coast with Walid Amine Sweid, accused by the United States of financing the Hezbollah party, classified as a Washington terrorist.

“They forced me into an alliance with Hezbollah when I have absolutely nothing to do with them except that official trip where eight deputies went (to Lebanon). From there it seems that I have ties to Hezbollah. Never! I condemn terrorism in all its forms, “Velázquez defended himself.

The press reported that as prosecutors in 2000, Velázquez and Duarte they made their fortune in Ciudad del Este, on the triple border with Foz de Iguazú (Brazil) and Puerto Iguazú (Argentina), in cases involving Syrian-Lebanese and Chinese merchants.

One of them, Kassem Mohammad Hijazi, was extradited to the United States last July. North American justice accused him of being the head of a money laundering organization in the Triple Frontier, targeting the Hezbollah movement, with operations estimated at around $ 3 million a year.

The Lebanese was prosecuted in 2004 when Velázquez was working as Deputy Attorney General in that part of the country, where he had Duarte as his main collaborator.

In 2008, Hijazi resigned from the prosecution even though his name and the alleged illegal activity he was carrying out were broadcast in the Brazilian press.

In August 2021 he was captured in Ciudad del Este at the request of the North American judicial system and extradited on 8 July.

Assumption, special for Clarin

B. C