The Government of Chile to file complaint after former Venezuelan military officer goes missing
The Government of Gabriel Boric announced this Thursday that it will file a complaint for the kidnapping of the former Venezuelan military officer, Ronald Leandro Ojeda Moreno, 32, in Chilean territory. The Public Ministry is leading a secret investigation to find the whereabouts of Ojeda, an opponent of Nicolás Maduro’s regime, who was apparently kidnapped by four hooded individuals early Wednesday morning in his apartment in the municipality of Independencia, in the northern sector of Santiago.
According to the first versions, the four individuals posed as officials of the Investigative Police (PDI). In the midst of the series of hypotheses circulating, which includes an alleged Venezuelan counterintelligence operation, the Undersecretary of the Interior, Manuel Monsalve, reiterated this afternoon that none have been ruled out.
“It always seems to us that the complaint presented by the Government by the Ministry of the Interior is a very important decision,” Monsalve stated. “One, to give a political signal that the Government is interested in ensuring that these cases do not remain unpunished and, therefore, are clarified. But, also, because the Government becomes part of the efforts to clarify this type of crimes.”
The Chilean ambassador to Venezuela, Jaime Gazmuri, is managing a conversation with the vice minister for the Americas of the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry. According to the Government spokesperson, Camila Vallejo, because this is a “very serious event”, contacts have been maintained with Caracas at all levels: Government, police and through the corresponding prosecutor’s offices. As a result of the case, the Chilean Executive requested this Wednesday from Interpol an international alert, in addition to the protection of the country’s borders, both land, sea and air.
President Gabriel Boric is on vacation, but he participated electronically in a meeting with members of his Cabinet about the deployment. “Obviously, the president considers this a priority,” said Monsalve, who participated in the meeting with the chancellor, Alberto Van Klaveren, and the Minister of the Interior, Carolina Tohá. Government spokesperson, Camila Vallejo, added that the corresponding institutions have held several conversations to clarify and collaborate with the investigation process.
This morning there were a series of meetings in La Moneda to follow up on Ojeda’s kidnapping. The Minister of Justice, Luis Cordero, and Undersecretary Monsalve held a meeting with the national prosecutor, Ángel Valencia, and prosecutor Héctor Barros, who coordinates the team against Organized Crime and Homicides (ECOH); Tohá and Monsalve also met with senior PDI officials. “In investigations of this nature, coordination with the Public Ministry is very important, which is in charge of the investigation and therefore conducts the proceedings to clarify the possible crime,” Monsalve noted this afternoon.
Ojeda is one of the 33 soldiers of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB) expelled and demoted on January 24. The Ministry of Defense of the Government of Nicolás Maduro published the list in which the anti-Chavista activist appeared. Caracas explained that the military was sanctioned for allegedly being “involved in conspiracies” such as the planning of “criminal and terrorist” actions to attack the Government system, the authorities and institutions of the State, even contemplating the assassination of the president, according to the Defense statement. The alleged actions in Venezuela represent “acts of treason to the country.”
In 2017, according to his testimony collected on Twitter (now “The “generals and politicians” are clowns without morals, tyrants on duty,” he wrote in reference to Maduro and his Cabinet members. The Chilean Government has not confirmed whether Ojeda has the category of political refugee, since this is information that cannot be made public by law.