The National Court orders to file the investigation into the alleged illegal financing of Podemos via Venezuela

The Criminal Chamber admits a last appeal from the Prosecutor's Office and orders an end to the investigations into the 'purple' accounts

MADRID, 27 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Criminal Chamber of the National Court has estimated the last appeal presented by the Prosecutor's Office, ordering the file of the investigation into the alleged illegal financing of Podemos through Venezuela that was launched as a result of the statements of the former head of the Intelligence of that country Hugo 'El Pollo' Carvajal.

In this way, the magistrates have again aligned themselves with the Public Ministry, which in its successive appeals against the proceedings commissioned by the Central Court of Instruction Number 6 has been warning that it was a prospective investigation, according to eldiario.es. and they have confirmed legal sources to Europa Press.

The Chamber already agreed with the Public Prosecutor in a previous appeal that meant limiting the inquiries of the head of said court, Manuel García Castellón, to verifying Carvajal's account and the witnesses indicated by him, but without focusing on proper names such as those of the founders of Podemos Juan Carlos Monedero, Carolina Bescansa, Jorge Lago and Ariel Jerez.

There is a paradox that when the magistrates limited these investigations for the first time, the instructor had already received a first report from the UDEF where credibility was given to the story made by Carvajal about the relations between members of the Venezuelan Government and founders of Podemos, a 'dossier' that was not challenged by the Public Ministry, so the investigation could continue based on it.

This time a similar situation has occurred again because the file of the Chamber arrives when the Economic and Fiscal Crimes Unit had already sent the magistrate its latest advances, according to the sources consulted by this news agency.

It is the second time that the National High Court undertakes an investigation into the 'purple' accounts. The first was closed in 2016, when it was only supported by the so-called 'PISA Report', but it was reopened last year as a result of the information provided by 'El Pollo' as part of the "collaboration process" with the Spanish Justice that began when he was arrested for extradition to the United States after spending nearly two years on the run.

The procedures initially entrusted to the UDEF were aimed at verifying what was reflected in the documents delivered by Carvajal. Among them, a payment order that the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, would have issued in 2013 to pay 142,000 dollars to Bescansa, Jerez and Lago for the commission that he would have made them to devise the "communicational political design" of the 'stand' of the state oil company PDVSA at the 2014 World Petroleum Congress in Moscow.

He also provided another payment order that Hugo Chávez himself would have issued in 2008 to pay 6.7 million dollars to the CEPS Foundation, linked to Podemos, to "promote a political change even more akin to the Bolivarian government." In this document, which was revealed in 2016 by different media, Pablo Iglesias, Jorge Vestrynge and Monedero were expressly cited as "outstanding professors" whom he would define as "natural allies of the Bolivarian revolution."

In addition, in a document included in this documentary block, the former head of Intelligence indicated that Monedero would have collected 600,000 euros by hand in a Caracas hotel that would have left the Cuban Embassy in Venezuela.

At this time, Carvajal is awaiting his extradition process to the United States, which was reactivated on September 9, when he was arrested by the National Police, during a joint operation with the US DEA, in an apartment in Madrid where he lived " totally cloistered", as described then by the security body.

The American power claims him for alleged crimes of arms and drug trafficking. His delivery to Washington was approved in 2020, but it could not materialize because 'El Pollo' fled in November 2019, although his defense emphasizes that he never left Spain. After several comings and goings, his extradition to the United States remains paralyzed.

The former head of Military Counterintelligence with Chávez and Maduro is persecuted in Washington for events that occurred between 1999 and 2019, when he would have belonged to the so-called 'Cartel of the Suns', a criminal organization supposedly managed by 'Chavista' charges that, with the alleged collaboration of the FARC and other armed groups, would have introduced large quantities of drugs into the United States.