<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, has asked Spain to extradite former opposition MP Dinorah Figuera, president of the National Assembly of Venezuela in exile and who has been accused by the authorities of her country of stealing assets and resources frozen abroad due to international sanctions.</strong></h4> “Just as we extradite criminals to those countries, we ask for Figuera's extradition, so that she can face justice,” declared the Venezuelan president last week during his appearance on the program ‘Maduro Live de Sudente’, broadcast by the state television channel VTV. Dinorah Figuera, 62, a former student leader and deputy general secretary of the opposition party Primero Justicia, was a MP for the state of Aragua between 2016-2021 and participated in protests against the Maduro government between 2017 and 2018. As a result, she spent ten days in the French Embassy in Caracas in 2018 due to harassment by the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service, until she was able to leave her country for Spain, where she resides (specifically in Valencia) under political asylum. In January 2023, she was elected president of the IV Legislature of the National Assembly of Venezuela, replacing Juan Guaidó (recognized at the time as “president in charge” of Venezuela by several governments, including that of Pedro Sánchez), a position she holds from exile in Spain. On January 8, the Venezuelan government issued an arrest warrant against her, and in October 2023, the Venezuelan judicial system approved a first extradition request against Dinorah Figuera for the crimes of “treason, money laundering, usurpation of functions and criminal association.” In last week’s statements, Maduro accused Figuera of “stealing Citgo,” the subsidiary of the Venezuelan oil company (PDVSA) in the United States, and assured that both she and several former parliamentarians, including Juan Guaidó (whom he called a “bandit”) “increased their monthly salary by 40% and receive up to $10,000 each.” For her part, the executive vice president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, assured that this group, which she described as "a gang of thieves", intends to steal the "assets of the Venezuelan people through an Assembly" that does not exist, in reference to the AN of 2016-2021, which has been recognized by the US as "the last democratically elected institution" in Venezuela. At the end of December, the National Assembly announced its intention to request the Public Prosecutor's Office to apply the so-called "Simón Bolívar Law" (the "Liberator Simón Bolívar Organic Law against the Imperialist Blockade and in Defense of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela", approved by the National Assembly of Venezuela in November 2024 and which provides for sentences of between 25 and 30 years in prison and fines of up to one million euros, in addition to a political disqualification of up to 60 years, for people who support or are involved in sanctions against the Venezuelan government or authorities) to these former MPs on the accusation of having "arbitrarily and illegally" accessed Citgo assets. Maduro's request came shortly after receiving the credentials of the new Spanish ambassador, Álvaro Albacete, before whom he defended the importance of "strengthening bilateral relations between Venezuela and Spain" and highlighted the "desire of both countries to promote dialogue and cooperation in various areas."
