Free Republic

Venezuela’s ex-vice president and now the top confidant of Nicolas Maduro is said to have tried sneaking in Hezbollah militants into his country, made a business deal with a drug lord and became extremely wealthy as the once-rich country turned into an economic basket case. Tareck El Aissami has emerged as a hardliner of Maduro’s socialist regime as the country remains on the brink of an all-out civil war due to economic misery. **SNIP** But El Aissami, while not having the same scrutiny as Maduro, has long been the subject of various investigations both at home and in the U.S....

US President Donald Trump has chatted briefly with his Argentine counterpart, Mauricio Macri, on telephone discussing the region and Venezuela "in particular", a media report said. During the five-minute call on Wednesday, Trump reiterated his invitation to Macri to visit Washington and also said that he was "very happy" because new jobs were being created in the US, the Argentine President's office said in a statement. This was the second of such calls between the two leaders since Trump won the November 2016 election. Argentina said that the two leaders' talk was very cordial, but provided no further details, Efe...

Moments ago the U.S. Treasury Department announced official sanctions against Tareck Zaidan El Aissami Maddah (El Aissami). El Aissami is the Executive Vice President of Venezuela. WASHINGTON—Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated Venezuelan national Tareck Zaidan El Aissami Maddah (El Aissami) as a Specially Designated Narcotics Trafficker pursuant to the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (Kingpin Act) for playing a significant role in international narcotics trafficking. El Aissami is the Executive Vice President of Venezuela.

The Trump administration is slapping sanctions on Venezuela’s new Vice President Tareck El Aissami and accusing him of playing a major role in international drug trafficking. (snip) The U.S. is also sanctioning Samark Bello, a wealthy businessman connected to El Aissami who has held significant business interests in the U.S. The U.S. says Bello provided assistance or support to El Aissami’s trafficking activities.

It is unclear whether the cause of the syndrome is viral or bacterial – a distinction with implications for treatment – although autopsies have indicated that those who died were suffering from other complications, such as Chikungunya.Venezuelan hemorrhagic fever (VHF) is endemic in the two states of Portuguesa and Barinas, but transmission from person-to-person is uncommon.While samples have been sent to the Venezuelan National Institute of Health, the results have not yet been released publically and there is no suggestion from health officials that VHF is behind this particular outbreak.One doctor, who wishes to remain anonymous, attended a meeting last...

[MercoPress.com] VENEZUELA : Mysterious outbreak of hemorrhagic fever syndrome in Venezuela kills ten "An outbreak of a mysterious hemorrhagic fever syndrome in the Venezuelan state of Aragua and the country’s capital Caracas has left ten people dead in the last three weeks." Similar to Ebola, this syndrome causes patients to experience high fever, skin rashes and bleeding. It has been described as an aggressive disease that leads to a fatal deterioration of health within 72 hours. Doctors have urged government authorities to declare a state of emergency in Aragua state; however they have received resistance from a surprising source. The...

Students banging pots, and shouting "fraud", gathered at a busy Caracas intersection on Monday night, to protest election results in the tropical country.

Venezuela’s Tarek El-Aissami The Americas Report | Oct 03, 2008  By Nicole Ferrand [...] Mr. El - Aissami is a Venezuelan national of Syrian descent who, before becoming Minster of Interior and Justice, occupied the position of Deputy Interior Minister for Public Security. His father, Carlos Aissami, is the head of the Venezuelan branch of the Iraqi Baath political party. Before the invasion of Iraq, he held a press conference in which he described himself as a Taliban and called Osama Bin Laden, "the great Mujahedeen, Sheik Osama bin Laden." Tarek's great-uncle Shibli el-Aissami was a prominent ideologist and...