MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Paraguayan VP's brother sacked from Navy Chief post

No country is safe from a public bureaucracy contaminated by corruption and organized crime, Abdo argued

Paraguay's President Mario Abdo Benìtez reshuffled the country's Armed Forces brass before leaving for Montevideo Friday. Among those relieved from duty was Navy Chief Admiral Carlos Dionisio Velázquez, brother of Vice President Hugo Velázquez, who has been listed by the United States among the most corrupt politicians in the region.

The General Directorate of Social Communication of the Military Forces Friday announced the appointment of General Óscar Arnaldo Cardozo as commander of the Military Forces, while General César Augusto Moreno Landaira was made interim commander of the Paraguayan Army, and Vice-Admiral Juan Ramón Velázquez Fretes became interim commander of the Paraguayan Navy.

Also listed as a most corrupt politician was former President Horacio Cartes, whose tobacco company sent a shipment of cigarettes to Mexico aboard the controversial Venezuelan-flagged Emtrasur Boeing 747-300 currently under investigation in Argentina for its alleged links to Iran-sponsored terrorism.

One of the names that recurrently comes up around all these irregular activities is that of the Uruguay-born Sebastián Marset, a 31-year-old leader of a Paraguayan drug trafficking group linked to the First Uruguayan Cartel (PCU) who has been granted Paraguayan citizenship.

Asked about this case during the reopening of Asunción's embassy in Montevideo, Abdo replied that “our government was the one that knocked down that criminal structure, we had the deepest and most impacting blow to organized crime in the history of our country.”

He also underlined that over US$ 250 million worth of assets from organized crime groups had been transferred to the Paraguayan society.

Abdo also pointed out that his government was working together with Uruguay, Brazil, the United States, and Argentina because of the “need to have a policy of cooperation in the fight against organized crime and to strengthen our intelligence systems” which the Iranian-Venezuelan plane now at Buenos Aires' Ezeiza airport proved faulty.

Regarding Marset's activities, Abdo said it is all “a part of the corruption” affecting the region. “Before this fact, he was an ordinary citizen until all his ties with organized crime became evident.”

“Anyway, Paraguay, as any country, is not saved from a public bureaucracy that is also permeated by organized crime and corruption; where, obviously, there are spaces where organized crime can have this type of facilities as a consequence of a public bureaucracy contaminated by corruption and organized crime,” Abdo added.