US Compels Small African Country to Imprison Venezuelan Diplomat – International Human Rights Delegation Files Habeas Corpus to Free Alex Saab (Image by Jimmy Villalta / VWPics via AP Images)
The Venezuelan diplomat Alex Saab, imprisoned for trying to buy humanitarian supplies from Iran in legal international trade but in violation of
illegal US sanctions, is facing extradition to the US. That is like getting stabbed in the back and then being arrested for carrying a concealed weapon.
By Roger D. Harris
US extraterritorial judicial overreach
On June 12, 2020, Saab was on his way from Caracas to Tehran, when his plane had to make a routine fueling stop. While in the air, the pilot was informed that Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia would not allow the plane to land, ostensibly for COVID pandemic reasons. Instead, the plane was carefully choreographed to refuel in Cabo Verde, a small archipelago nation off the Atlantic coast of Africa.
Editor notes: Sara Flounders is part of a humanitarian delegation to Cabo Verde, led by Cabo Verdean religious leader Bishop Filipe Teixeira of the Diocese Of Saint Francis of Assisi, Catholic Church of the Americas. The delegation has tasked itself with exposing the U.S. role in the kidnapping, torture and…
VENEZUELAN businessman Alex Saab is being held in detention in Cape Verde, victim of political persecution and facing extradition to the US for having brokered commercial deals that, in the face of the brutal US blockade against Venezuela, would bring food, medicines, fuel and other desperately needed items to the South American nation.
Saab, a special envoy and ambassador to the African Union for Venezuela, was on a humanitarian mission flying from Caracas to Iran to procure food and petrol for Venezuela’s CLAP food assistance programme.
He was detained on a refuelling stop in Cape Verde and has been held in custody ever since June 12 2020.
Venezuelan diplomat kidnapped: Release Alex Saab!
By Sara Flounders posted on May 27, 2021
Nearly a year ago, on June 12, 2020, Alex Saab was pulled off a plane at an U.S. demand for his arrest, during a refueling stop in the Republic of Cabo Verde, a small and very poor island archipelago nation off the West Coast of Africa.
Saab, a Venezuelan diplomat to the African Union, was on a humanitarian mission to Iran at the time of his seizure to arrange emergency shipments of food, medicines and essential supplies for Venezuela. Held in Cabo Verde since then, Saab was held for months in prison in total isolation and darkness and has been tortured.