Bolivia Says Cocaine Goes Through Cuba and Venezuela to the United States and Europe

A small plane and packages of cocaine seized by the Bolivian government. (Screen capture)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 6 October 2020 — Bolivian Interior Minister Arturo Murillo pointed to Cuba and Venezuela as springboards for the cocaine produced in that Andean country and marketed in the United States or Europe.

After an anti-drug operation, Murillo appeared in front of the cameras to report the arrest of a Venezuelan citizen and the seizure of 202 kilos of cocaine and a small plane.

“There are Venezuelans who are involved in the coca-cocaine circuit. A lot of the drugs that is produced or crystallized in Bolivia goes to Cuba and Venezuela and it is a vicious circle that later takes it to the United States and Europe,” he said.

According to the minister, the seizure of this plan resulted in an approximately 1.3 millon dollar loss to the cartels. In addition, he said, the Bolivian government destroyed an airstrip and a laboratory.

“Fourteen years of impunity and protection for drug trafficking are over,” said Murillo, in reference to the management of former President Evo Morales who resigned in November of last year after protests over alleged electoral fraud. He is now living in Argentina.

The Executive branch headed by interim president Jeanine Áñez has been very critical of the Cuban and Venezuelan regimes, both close allies of the Morales government, with whom they formed ALBA (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America), the left-wing alliance promoted in 2004 by the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, which now has nine member states.

Áñez has accused both countries of interference in Bolivia’s internal affairs, expelled more than 700 Cuban professionals working in the country, and promised to investigate cases of alleged corruption under the previous government.

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