MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Venezuela's Supreme Court okays Milei's prosecution

The Boeing 747-300 freighter was said to have been used by Iran's Mahan Air for logistics support to terrorist operations abroad

The Criminal Chamber of Venezuela's Supreme Court (TSJ) Monday gave its nod to the prosecution of Argentine President Javier Milei, Presidential Secretary Karina Milei, and Security Minister Patricia Bullrich in connection with the impounding and handing over of Emtrasur's Boeing 747-300 freighter handed over to the United States where the aircraft was wanted for its alleged involvements in terrorist activities under its previous Iranian ownership.

Venezuela's Attorney General Tarek William Saab also announced the appointment of two special prosecutors to investigate human rights violations in Argentina by the current Libertarian administration.

According to Saab, Milei is also involved in money laundering, simulation of punishable acts, illegal deprivation of liberty, illegal interference in the operational security of civil Aviation, and disabling of an aircraft.

In June 2022, the Venezuelan freighter landed in Argentina and was denied refueling pursuant to a US embargo. The crew of 5 Iranians and 14 Venezuelans then tried to tank up in Montevideo but was denied landing clearance and was forced back to Buenos Aires Ezeiza airport where they were all detained and eventually released. But the airplane was impounded and handed over to US authorities in February this year, where it was scrapped.

“A crime was committed against a Conviasa Emtrasur Airplane that was hijacked, they took away the colors of the flag, erased the name of Luisa Cáceres de Arismendi, and then chopped it into pieces. That's the hatred they have for revolutionary and Bolivarian Venezuela......,” President Nicolás Maduro posted on social media on Feb. 29, 2024.

The US Justice Department claimed that the aircraft had belonged to Iran's Mahan Air, an airline said to have provided logistics support to Iran's Revolutionary Guard Quds Force. Maduro's regime has accused Argentina and the United States of “collusion” and of violating international aviation regulations. Some jurists have even argued that, in this case, US laws operated “extraterritorially as universal laws of obligatory compliance” in defiance of Public International Law, international civil aeronautics laws, and human rights.

With Monday's measure, the tension between Venezuela and Argentina was once again accentuated. It had already been growing since Milei came to power in December of last year and was further fueled when the Argentine diplomatic mission in Caracas was expelled following Buenos Aires' refusal to recognize Maduro as the legitimate winner of the controversial July 28 presidential elections. Milei has dubbed Maduro an “impoverishing socialist” and a “dictator” while the Bolivarian leader repeatedly likened the Argentine president to former Nazi Germany Führer Adolf Hitler.

The Argentine government has maintained that the aircraft's case had been handled by the Judiciary in a country where separation of powers existed, unlike in Venezuela.

Washington claimed that Mahan's sale to Emtrasur's mother company Conviasa violated US export control laws and also improperly benefited the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.