The former minister of Rafael Correa who fled Ecuador hides in Caracas and will seek asylum in Argentina

María de los Ángeles Duarte, sentenced to eight years in prison for corruption, hides in Caracas to seek political asylum from the government, after leaving the Argentine Embassy in Quito and escaping Ecuadorian justice to Venezuela. Casa Rosada will not oppose the request of the former minister of Rafael Correa, and awaits his next steps to speed up the delivery of his national passport which will allow him to enter the country without delay.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs already knows that Duarte is hiding in Caracas. Argentina’s ambassador to Ecuador, Gabriel Fucks, spoke with Duarte in recent hours. In this conversation, the former minister revealed to Fucks that she was in Caracas and that she was preparing to seek asylum at the Argentine diplomatic headquarters in Venezuela.

“I want to thank you for everything you have done for us”, Duarte told Fucks before hanging up.

The plural used by the fugitive ex-minister takes on its full meaning: she spent two years in the diplomatic residence of Quito with her son, whom she had with the Argentine singer Marcelo Pastore. And thanks to this family connection, Duarte applied for asylum, which the Ministry of Foreign Affairs granted and was never able to use by decision of Guillermo Lasso, President of Ecuador.

Duarte has been proven to have direct involvement in the case Bribes 2012-2016. This forensic investigation revealed an irregular financing plot of the Alianza País movementthe political coalition led by Correa and one of its main protagonists was Duarte, who at the time was the head of the transport and public works portfolio.

The case involving Duarte Pesantes began in 2019. A Correa adviser -called Pamela Martínez- He carried an accounting book which recorded the illegal contributions of private companies to the political apparatus of the former president. Among these companies was the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht, which faced corruption cases throughout Latin America.

Lasso resisted the request for asylum requested by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, arguing that this legal advantage does not exist for those convicted of corruption. And that’s why he never granted the safe conduct that would have allowed Duarte and his son to leave the Argentine Embassy in Quito and fly to Buenos Aires.

Lasso’s political situation has deteriorated in recent months and Duarte took advantage of this situation to plan his escape to Caracas. enjoy the weekend, the complacency of the Ecuadorian police who guards the door of the Argentine Embassy and fled to Venezuela.

Fucks found out that Duarte left the embassy over the weekend. Staff at the diplomatic residence found the rooms used by the former minister with her 11-year-old son empty. Fucks informed Santiago Cafiero and the Minister of Foreign Affairs passed this information on to Alberto Fernández.

In Balcarce 50 believe that Duarte had a clandestine operation designed and carried out by former President Correa, who was granted asylum in Belgium. Correa, who was found guilty of corruption in the same case as Duarte, reportedly articulated contacts in Quito to allow his former minister to take a clandestine flight to Venezuela.

To the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in turn, they explain that it is impossible that Duarte escaped without a certain degree of political flexibility of the Lasso government. They consider it impossible for the ex-minister to board a plane bound for Caracas because of the absolute ignorance of the president, his intelligence services and the security forces.

In Venezuela they were waiting for Duarte and they gave him a safe house to hide with his children. The former minister hopes that the Argentine ambassador in Caracas, Oscar Laborde, will inform her when she must go to the diplomatic headquarters to process her Argentine passport and receive the letter that officially grants her political asylum.

It is a secret movement that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has authorized on the instructions of Alberto Fernández. And meanwhile, Cafiero keeps his form in the face of claims by President Lasso and his foreign minister Juan Carlos Holguín, who demand more than an official explanation from the Argentine government.

“The Chancellor cafe santiago statement Monday afternoon with the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Human Mobility of Ecuador, Juan Carlos Holguin, inform you that the Ecuadorian citizen Maria de los Angeles Duarte Pesantes -who had been staying with his son, a minor and of Argentine nationality, in the residence of the Embassy of our country in Quito since August 20, 2020- is no longer in the said legation, which is guarded both in its access and in its part external by the National Police of Ecuador”, make the statement issued by the Palacio San Martín to comply with protocol forms.

Duarte is already in Caracas, the government will grant him political asylum and Nicolás Maduro will facilitate his arrival in Buenos Aires, as promised to Correa, who pulls the strings from Belgium. An escape and rescue operation which benefits a former Ecuadorian minister sentenced for public corruption.

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