SAO PAULO
President Nicolás Maduro on Wednesday, accused a Colombian paramilitary group linked to former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe as responsible for the double murder of a ruling party lawmaker and his partner.
Robert Serra was stabbed to death, along with his assistant, María Herrera, on Oct. 1 at his home in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas. He was considered a rising star in Maduro's governing PSUV party.
Maduro told reporters at a late night press conference that the crime was "completely solved" and Serra's security guard had admitted to cooperating with a Colombia paramilitary figure who was the mastermind of the deputy's murder.
"We have identified (the Colombian paramilitary), we know his movements ... but we lack his legal identification," Maduro was cited by local news site Noticias24 as saying. He alleged that the foreign suspect, known as "El Colombia," was part of a gang called the Colombia Paramilitary Organization that "meticulously"planned the crime.
Eight people were involved in the murder, of which six "direct perpetrators" have been identified, Maduro said.
Four of those involved were still at large and Interpol has been contacted with their names, according to local reports.
Maduro also said that there had been a series of attempts on the lives of other top socialist party officials, including president of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, and Education Minister Héctor Rodríguez.
Maduro also said that terrorists groups linked to Uribe were operating in Venezuela with a view to destabilizing the country.
"You don't know how many events and terrorist acts we have foiled by the arrests we have made," the president said, adding that three different terrorist groups were "captured" just two days before Serra was killed, that were planning on planting bombs in Caracas.
Uribe and Maduro have frequently exchanged words in the past, and in May, Maduro accused Uribe of being behind a plot to assassinate him.
Maduro, who took office last year after the death of Hugo Chávez, previously said Serra's murder was attributable to "ultra-right" opposition groups backed by Colombian militants.
But critics have accused Maduro of using the murder for political ends, and some have suggested the murder was simply a violent robbery in a nation that, according to U.N. figures, has the second-highest murder rate of any peacetime country in the world.
www.aa.com.tr/en
