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President Joe Biden greenlit the release of Colombian businessman Alex Saab, accused of acting as Venezuelan socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro’s top money launderer, on Wednesday. Saab’s release is allegedly the result of a prisoner swap with the rogue socialist regime that will also allow for the release of unjustly detained Americans in Venezuela, the Associated Press reported. Saab, 51, is a close personal ally of Maduro and is widely considered the socialist dictator’s financial brain. American law enforcement authorities arrested Saab in Cape Verde in 2020 after the Department of Justice indicted him in 2019 on charges of laundering $350...

Saab was charged with money laundering in the US One of President Nicolás Maduro's closest aides has been extradited from Cape Verde to the United States, where he's been charged with money laundering. The US Treasury says Alex Saab worked as a front man for Mr Maduro's regime. The Venezuelan government suspended talks soon afterwards with the US-backed opposition. The talks were to resolve a political crisis that has led to violence and the collapse of the economy

Iran, Turkey, and Venezuela's Super Facilitator: Who Is Slex Saab? On June 12, Alex Nain Saab Morán, a Colombian businessman of Lebanese  descent, was arrested at Amílcar Cabral International airport in Cape Verde. This was a huge blow to the Maduro regime’s illicit networks, as Saab is a key facilitator, involved in alleged corrupt dealings and money laundering in Venezuela since 2004.  His arrest was made after years of investigations on behalf of the U.S. and Colombia to uncover a myriad of shell companies that Saab; his business partner, Alvaro Pulido Vargas; and family members set up. Considered a fugitive in Colombia,...

Geologists think that the eastern slope of Fogo volcano crashed into the sea some 65,000 to 124,000 years ago, leaving a giant scar where a new volcano can be seen growing in this satellite image. Credit: NASA ========================================================================================================================================= Scientists working off west Africa in the Cape Verde Islands have found evidence that the sudden collapse of a volcano there tens of thousands of years ago generated an ocean tsunami that dwarfed anything ever seen by humans. The researchers say an 800-foot wave engulfed an island more than 30 miles away. The study could revive a simmering controversy over whether sudden...

Waves the size of the Chrysler building may seem like they belong in a movie trailer, but scientists have recently found that megatsunamis are all too real. Scientists say that 73,000 years ago, a large flank (or slope) from the volcanic island Fogo in the Cape Verde islands off the coast of Africa fell into the ocean and triggered a tsunami that could – quite literally – move mountains. “You’re displacing a huge mass, which must generate movement of water,” Ricardo Ramalho, the lead researcher behind the study, told The Washington Post. “And in the case of volcanic flank collapses...

The island country of Cape Verde announced on Wednesday that it will no longer be voting against Israel in the United Nations. The decision came following a meeting between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Cape Verde’s President Jorge Carlos Fonseca, who then instructed his envoy at the UN that the island in West Africa would no longer be voting against Israel. Netanyahu welcomed the decision on Wednesday evening. …

Rhode Island House Speaker Gordon Fox is resigning from his leadership post and will not run for re-election, he said Saturday, a day after federal and state authorities raided his Statehouse office and home as part of a criminal investigation that they would not detail. “Because of the respect I have for all members of the House of Representatives, I am resigning as Speaker,” Fox said in a written statement emailed to reporters. “The process of governing must continue and the transition of leadership must be conducted in an orderly manner.” The 52-year-old Providence Democrat, who became the nation’s first...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Law enforcement officials raided the office and home of House Speaker Gordon Fox on Friday as part of a criminal investigation by the U.S. attorney's office, FBI, IRS and state police. Officials would not say who or what was being investigated, but authorities worked for hours inside the Democratic House speaker's Statehouse office while state police troopers stood outside. Authorities entered the office carrying an evidence bag and empty cardboard boxes Friday morning. Fox's spokesman, Larry Berman, said state police had asked everyone working in the office to leave, but he didn't know why. At around...

SNIPPET: "WASHINGTON, April 2 (UPI) -- A blackout of al-Qaida's main Web sites is in its 11th day, and officials think the forums may have been brought down in a cyberattack. While no one has claimed credit for disabling the sites..." SNIPPET: "The loss of information typically confuses and frustrates the readers of the Web sites. "It leaves the rank-and-file to guess which messages and which messengers are genuine al-Qaida, and provides undercover operators with new opportunities to disrupt the movement," said A. Aaron Weisburd, senior fellow at the Homeland Security Policy Institute."

Cape Verde, one of Africa's most stable and prosperous nations, headed for change Monday as liberal opposition candidate Jorge Carlos Fonseca unseated the party which held the presidency for a decade. Fonseca, a former foreign minister, won 54.90 percent of the vote Sunday, besting his socialist rival Manuel Inocencio Sousa, who garnered 45.91 percent of the vote, according to results from 99.28 percent of polling stations. Lauded as an African success story for achieving political and economic stability, the island country keeps afloat through tourism and the service industry despite meagre natural resources and water shortages. The election in the...

"Democracy is a charming form of government, full of variety and disorder, and dispensing a sort of equality to equals and unequal alike" Plato (BC 427 - 374BC). Open rigging and clinging brazenly to power have become common features of emerging democracies in the world today especially in Africa. Many Countries in Africa have become accustomed to "sit-tight dictators" or military style of leadership, with democracy being propelled by the West for their replacement. This is at the centre of the on-going conflict in many emerging democratic nations. Democratization of the world today as being championed by United States of...

The Russian security service released the crew of the Arctic Sea in Moscow on Sunday. The 11 members of the crew of the hijacked ship were flown from Cape Verde to Russia nearly two weeks ago. The Russian news agency Interfax reports that the men returned to their home town of Archangelsk, where they were met by their families. On Sunday, Russian authorities gave conflicting accounts of whether or not all of the crew would be released. The online portal life.ru reported that only nine members of the crew had been released. Rabbe von Hertzen of the Finnish National Bureau...

Starting in the late 1990s, China's presence on the African continent experienced a phenomenal expansion. Far more profound changes, however, have been underway and may only become apparent in the next decade. These changes are likely to transform the regional economic landscape of the African continent in ways never seen before. Chinese experts apparently believe that Africa is entering an era of relative stability and that the time to explore its untapped resources has arrived [1]. Chinese policymakers see in Africa possible solutions to some of China's most pressing problems, for instance, Beijing's need to secure access to energy resources...

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) - Plans to close Guantanamo are not sitting well with the Sept. 11 victims' relatives who sat stunned while two alleged terrorists declared they were proud of their role in the plot.

SNIPPET: "The Department of Defense announced the transfer of two Guantanamo detainees today. Abdul Aziz Naji, a native of Algeria, was repatriated to his home country. Abd-al-Nisr Mohammed Khantumani, a Syrian, was resettled in Cape Verde, an island republic approximately 300 miles off the west coast of Africa." SNIPPET: "US military officials at Gitmo alleged that Abdul Aziz Naji (whose internment serial number at Gitmo was 744) was a member of Laskar-e-Taiba (LET), a Pakistani-based terrorist organization closely linked to al Qaeda. A senior intelligence official contacted by the Long War Journal explained that not only was Naji a member...

Here is video from California Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy holding a Town Hall Meeting in Bakersfield where he was asked why the Congress was allowing President Obama to create all the "Czars" he is creating. Just before he answered there were shouts from the audience of "He's a communist!" McCarthy answered the question by saying he did not believe Obama had the right to appoint these "Czars" AND give them powers that encroach on the "Checks and Balances" the Constitution requires. . . . . (Watch Video)

The military airlifted the suspected hijackers of the Arctic Sea and most of its Russian crew from Cape Verde to Moscow on Thursday, after the lumber freighter mysteriously vanished and reappeared in the Atlantic. Eleven of the 15 crew members arrived in Moscow, while the captain and three sailors remained on the ship, which was adrift about 200 nautical miles from the West African island nation of Cape Verde. Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said the freighter was sailing to the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk. The sailors and their suspected captors arrived in two separate Il-76 cargo jets at the...

Russian news agencies quote the defense minister as saying a freighter that went missing nearly three weeks ago has been found near Cape Verde, and its crew is alive

Breaking News Russia Finds Missing Merchant Ship Near Cape Verde Islands Monday, August 17, 2009 ] MOSCOW — DEVELOPING: Russia has found a missing freighter near the Cape Verde islands and its crew members have been taken aboard a Russian vessel, Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said... Developing