BUENOS AIRES (AP) — Paraguayan Vice President Hugo Velazquez Moreno said Friday he will resign next week in a while after being placed on a U. S. corruption list for his alleged involvement in the. . .
BUENOS AIRES (AP) — Paraguayan Vice President Hugo Velazquez Moreno said Friday he will resign next week in time after being placed on a U. S. corruption list for his alleged involvement in paying bribes to a public official.
The inclusion of Velázquez on the corruption list, announced Friday morning through the U. S. ambassador to Paraguay, Marc Ostfield, has shaken Paraguayan politics not only because of Moreno’s role in the administration of President Mario Abdo Benítez, but also because he is one of the main presidential candidates. Colorado Candidate of the party in next year’s elections.
Minutes after Ostfield spoke at a news conference at the U. S. Embassy in the Paraguayan capital of Asunción, Velazquez expressed his innocence but said he would drop his candidacy for president and submit his resignation to Congress next week so he could protect himself from the allegations.
“It hit me like a bucket of bloodless water,” Velazquez said in an interview with a local radio station. “I don’t know what he means because he didn’t give too many details. “
Juan Carlos Duarte, a former prosecutor who is a business partner and not a close public partner of Moreno, also included in the corruption list, Ostfield said.
Ostfield said Secretary of State Antony Blinken “has gained credible information” showing how “at the request of Vice President Velazquez, Duarte, his close private and associate, presented a bribe of more than a million dollars to an official. “
This bribery offer is “consistent with an obvious trend of corrupt activity” and, in this case, was made to “obstruct an investigation that threatened the vice president and his monetary interests,” Ostfield said.
As a result of those designations, Velázquez, Duarte and their immediate family will no longer be able to enter the United States.
Velazquez said he was “completely and totally” unaware of Ostfield’s detailed allegations.
Paraguay’s vice president said he would resign because he needs to “go out as a citizen to protect what I think is an injustice. “
In addition to his close relationship with Velázquez, Duarte is also legal advisor to the entity that manages the binational Yacyretá dam, jointly owned by Paraguay and Argentina.
“Duarte’s act of corruption abused and exploited his harsh and privileged public position within the binational entity of Yacyretá, jeopardizing public confidence in one of Paraguay’s most important economic assets,” the State Department said.
The appointment comes just weeks after a former Paraguayan president, Horacio Manuel Cartes, was also placed on a U. S. corruption list. The U. S. Department of Homeland Security for its “involvement in significant corruption. “Cartes served as president of Paraguay between August 2013 and August 2018.
Ostfield said the appointment “has nothing to do with politics” and that Washington “will continue to work hard with President Mario Abdo Benitez and his government on a variety of issues, adding the fight against corruption, impunity and money laundering and terrorist financing. “
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