{"id":181072,"date":"2026-01-05T00:05:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T06:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/sin-categoria\/nicaragua-on-the-drug-trafficking-route-according-to-u-s-indictment-against-nicolas-maduro\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T18:45:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T00:45:19","slug":"nicaragua-on-the-drug-trafficking-route-according-to-u-s-indictment-against-nicolas-maduro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/confidencial.digital\/en\/english\/nicaragua-on-the-drug-trafficking-route-according-to-u-s-indictment-against-nicolas-maduro\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicaragua on the Drug Trafficking Route, According to U.S. Indictment Against Nicol\u00e1s Maduro"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The U.S. Attorney\u2019s Office for the Southern District of New York has accused Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro of leading a regional drug trafficking network that for more than two decades allegedly operated from Venezuela to the United States using air routes and subsequent overland transfers through Central America, including Nicaragua, according to the formal indictment filed in a U.S. federal court.<\/p>\n\n

The court document details that the so-called Cartel of the Suns\u2014designated a terrorist organization by the United States in November 2025<\/a>\u2014allegedly dispatched shipments of cocaine from Venezuelan territory to Mexico and then to the United States, using Nicaragua and Honduras as strategic transit points.<\/p>\n\n

According to the indictment, the cartel operated in alliance with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), an organization designated as terrorist by the U.S. State Department since 1997, which became one of the world\u2019s largest producers of cocaine. <\/p>\n\n

In 2009, the filing underscores, senior Venezuelan officials\u2014including Maduro himself, who was serving as foreign minister at the time\u2014along with Diosdado Cabello and Hugo Armando Carvajal Barrios, who also appear on the list of defendants, held a meeting with FARC representatives in which they discussed the shipment of a four-ton load of cocaine. <\/p>\n\n

\u201cCabello Rond\u00f3n ordered the FARC to deliver the cocaine to a specific point in Venezuela, where a plane would be waiting to transport it to Nicaragua for subsequent shipment to Mexico and importation into the United States,\u201d the indictment stated on January 3, 2026\u2014the same day the operation called Absolute Resolution <\/a>took place, which included multiple airstrikes in Venezuela and resulted in the arrest of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. <\/p>\n\n

The meeting also addressed the coup in Honduras against then-president Manuel Zelaya in June 2009, and Cabello Rond\u00f3n warned that the political instability could \u201cscrew up the business.\u201d <\/p>\n\n

Indictment Does Not Charge Nicaraguan Officials<\/h2>\n\n

The indictment, however, does not directly implicate officials of the Daniel Ortega\u2013Rosario Murillo regime, though it does mention Nicaragua as one of the regional countries through which the shipments allegedly passed en route to the United States.<\/p>\n\n

The Ortega\u2013Murillo regime has not publicly responded to the references contained in the U.S. indictment.<\/p>\n\n

Since Daniel Ortega\u2019s return to power in 2007, Nicaragua has maintained a strategic alliance with the Venezuelan government, first under Hugo Ch\u00e1vez (1954\u20132013) and later under Nicol\u00e1s Maduro. That relationship has included political and economic cooperation<\/a> as well as mutual diplomatic support in international forums. <\/p>\n\n

Nicaraguan political scientist Manuel Orozco, director of the Migration, Remittances, and Development program at Inter-American Dialogue, explained in the article titled What Is at Stake in Nicaragua After Maduro\u2019s Fall in Venezuela?<\/a>, published in CONFIDENCIAL, that Maduro\u2019s capture following the U.S. military airstrike raises new questions about the fate of Rosario Murillo, her children, and the Nicaraguan military. <\/p>\n\n

The Ortega\u2013Murillo regime, in a brief statement, demanded \u201crespect for the sovereignty of the Venezuelan people\u201d and called for Maduro\u2019s release. <\/p>\n\n

What Is Nicol\u00e1s Maduro Accused Of?<\/h2>\n\n

The document\u2014signed by U.S. federal prosecutor Geoffrey S. Berman and filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York\u2014charges Maduro with narco-terrorism, conspiracy to import cocaine into the United States, and the use, possession, and conspiracy to possess weapons of war, including machine guns and destructive devices, as part of a criminal network that operated for more than two decades.<\/p>\n\n

In addition to Nicol\u00e1s Maduro and Diosdado Cabello, the other defendants are: <\/p>\n\n