We’ll go Down The Rabbit Hole in a few but first…The Times Of India had this headline, “Crude From Heavily Sanctioned Nations Now Make Up A Third Of India And China Total Oil Imports”.

 China and India took more than 30% of their combined imports in April from Venezuela, Iran, and Russia according to data tracking firm Kpler. The two countries are taking advantage of the situation to secure steep discounts and neither are particularly concerned with sanctions by the US and EU.

 Then we have Rio Times reporting that in an official communique the Venezuela government invited Guyana to resume talks over the disputed territory of the Essequibo, a region found in recent years to contain rich oil and gas deposits.

 Guyana filed a unilateral claim before the International Court of Justice that traditional territorial borders, established in 1899, be respected while Venezuela says the International Court has no jurisdiction.

 It’s worth noting that until there were major oil and gas finds Venezuela didn’t care about the region. If the Chavistas are calling for dialog it’s a sure sign they expect to lose in court.

 Then we have Cryptopolitan with the headline, “Operational Issues Plague Venezuela’s Petro Blockchain Affecting User Transactions”. Hundreds of “Petro Wallets” have been blocked or eliminated.

 Venezuela journalist and National Assembly member, Mario Silva, criticized the lack of explanation provided to affected users and there are concerns among the cryptocurrency community about the trust and reliability of the Venezuela cryptocurrency ecosystem.

 There is also the involvement of Sunacrip, Venezuela’s cryptocurrency regulatory agency, in the widespread corruption probe (purge?). Various cryptocurrency organizations are demanding an investigation and a clear and forceful response from authorities.

 OK, I can’t take it anymore. These guys are treating it like it was a legitimate cryptocurrency instead of the fraud it’s been even in it’s preliminary stages before the various “official launches”.

 We did an entire chapter on this fraud in Venezuela : Down The Rabbit Hole and “El Petro” was best described years ago by The Washington Post. “The Petro might be the most obviously horrible investment ever”.

 Now, let’s head Down The Rabbit Hole…

 Chapter 14 continued…

 …History is replete with authoritarian regimes using secret police to terrorize and control the population, the most infamous being the Gestapo under Hitler and the Nazis. The Gestapo had nothing on these guys not to mention that the Nazis had one secret police organization (two if you count the SS although there was nothing secret about the SS). Prior to 2017 the Chavistas had two secret police departments, the DGCIM (military intelligence), and SEBIN (government intelligence). The fact that Maduro felt the need to establish a third speaks volumes about Chavismo in general and Nicolas Maduro in particular.

 In 2017 the FAES was created to (of course) protect the people. Nothing could be further from the truth. While DGCIM and SEBIN were widely known for “disappearing people” and their operations were cloaked in secrecy, the FAES is widely known for killing people and there is nothing secret about it. People are routinely killed in their living rooms in front of their families or dragged outside to be shot where their neighbors can see. They are masked, dressed in black, and carry long guns and when they come they’re not coming to arrest anyone. Occasionally you may see one of them in uniform without a mask but that’s usually in the daytime. It’s not even clear who’s in the chain of command. They are affiliated with the PNB, the National Police, but that’s really all anyone knows about them, and it seems nobody really wants to ask…would you?

 While DGCIM and SEBIN may be a notch below FAES on the lethality scale they are no less terrifying. Captain Acosta was in the hands of DGCIM and Fernando Alban was detained by SEBIN. While they weren’t dragged out into the street and shot in the head, FAES style, they are no less dead. Both groups, for the most part, operate with impunity and have come under fire for Human Rights violations. In March, 2019 DGCIM had 15 members denounced by the OAS (Organization Of American States) along with three prosecutors and two MPs (assembly members). It is frequently reported by attorneys that they have been able to secure release orders for clients only to be frustrated by SEBIN. SEBIN is under direct control of the Vice President of the country so it is their stance that, when they choose to, they can disregard court orders and will only recognize orders from the office of the VP. It happens all the time and without an independent judiciary there is no recourse.

 More tomorrow….