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Obama Freezes Assets of Seven Venezuelan Officials Obama Order Freezes Assets of 7 Officials in Venezuela
(about 7 hours later)
CARACAS, Venezuela — President Obama signed an executive order on Monday that froze the assets in the United States of seven midlevel Venezuelan government officials, saying they were implicated in human rights violations in the South American country. CARACAS, Venezuela — Citing “an extraordinary threat to the national security of the United States,” President Obama on Monday signed an executive order freezing any American assets belonging to seven Venezuelan law enforcement and military officials who it said were linked to human rights violations.
The order described a climate of eroding human rights guarantees and rampant corruption in Venezuela as an “extraordinary threat to the national security” of the United States. The sanctioned officials included the current and a former head of the intelligence police, a former commander of the National Guard and a prosecutor involved in filing charges against opposition politicians accused of taking part in conspiracies against the government of President Nicolás Maduro.
The officials included a prosecutor involved in filing charges against opposition politicians alleging that they took part in conspiracies against the government of President Nicolás Maduro. One of the opposition politicians charged by the prosecutor was Antonio Ledezma, the mayor of Caracas, who was jailed last month and accused of plotting to overthrow Mr. Maduro, an accusation that Mr. Ledezma has denied. The charges against him and others were based on fabricated or implausible evidence, according to the White House.
Those charges were based on fabricated or implausible evidence, according to information provided by the White House. The opposition politicians included Antonio Ledezma, the mayor of Caracas, who was jailed last month and charged with plotting to overthrow Mr. Maduro, a charge that he has denied. The others sanctioned included military and police officials.
The other officials included current or former leaders of the national guard, the armed forces, the intelligence police and the national police.
“We are deeply concerned by the Venezuelan government’s efforts to escalate intimidation of its political opponents,” the Obama administration said in a statement.“We are deeply concerned by the Venezuelan government’s efforts to escalate intimidation of its political opponents,” the Obama administration said in a statement.
The executive order is intended to implement a law passed by Congress in December to levy sanctions on Venezuelan officials involved in human rights abuses. It allows for the freezing of bank accounts, real estate or other property. Venezuelan officials condemned the American action, citing it as proof that the United States was planning a military intervention.
Tensions have been rising steadily between Washington and Caracas recently. Mr. Obama’s action comes a little more than a week after Mr. Maduro ordered the United States Embassy in Caracas to reduce its staff and said that Americans would now need visas to travel to Venezuela. The visa requirement went into effect abruptly last week, potentially forcing some American to cancel their trips. “We are a threat to the United States?” said Diosdado Cabello, the National Assembly speaker in a televised speech, invoking the story of David and Goliath. “What is being planned are attacks against our land, against our country, military attacks. American imperialism uses these emergency resolutions every time it is going to attack a country, to say that it feels threatened.”
Mr. Maduro, who is facing a severe economic crisis exacerbated by the fall in the price of oil, his country’s only major export, regularly accuses Washington of seeking to overthrow him by engineering or supporting a coup. The United States has denied the charges, saying that Mr. Maduro is using the allegations to distract attention from his country’s problems. The United States has dismissed previous Venezuelan charges that it was planning military action or seeking to undermine Mr. Maduro’s government.
The Venezuelan foreign minister, Delcy Rodríguez, said in a Twitter post that Caracas was recalling its top embassy official from Washington for consultation, a diplomatic gesture of protest. The United States and Venezuela have not had ambassadors in each other’s capitals since 2008.
The executive order carries out a law passed by Congress in December to levy sanctions on Venezuelan officials involved in human rights abuses during protests last year. It allows for the freezing of bank accounts, real estate or other property.
It was not clear, however, whether the officials being sanctioned actually owned property in the United States. An administration official said that designating those to be sanctioned was a first step and that a search to see whether they had assets that could be frozen would now begin.
The administration official, who was not allowed to discuss policy publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, also said that in order to carry out sanctions of this type, the law required the president to declare the nation whose officials are sanctioned to be a national security threat. The official cautioned that the declaration was meant to meet the legal requirement and did not represent “a recategorization of the actual circumstances in Venezuela.”
Similar declarations were made in the past against countries like Iran, Syria and Myanmar in order to carry out sanctions, the official added.