Ramón Rodríguez Chacín (born November 9, 1951) is a Venezuelan politician. A retired naval officer, he was Minister of the Interior and Justice in 2002, and again in 2008. He took part in the November 1992 coup attempt.

Early years

Rodríguez Chacín specialized in

counter-insurgency Counterinsurgency (COIN, or NATO spelling counter-insurgency) is "the totality of actions aimed at defeating irregular forces". The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any "military or political action taken against the ac ...

and

counter-intelligence Counterintelligence (counter-intelligence) or counterespionage (counter-espionage) is any activity aimed at protecting an agency's intelligence program from an opposition's intelligence service. It includes gathering information and conducting ac ...

tactics while serving in the military of Venezuela. He graduated from the Venezuelan Naval School in 1970. Rodríguez Chacín was one of the founders of the ''Comando Específico José Antonio Páez (Cejap)'', an elite group of police and military forces intended to fight

Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army (, FARC–EP or FARC) was a Marxist–Leninist Guerrilla warfare, guerrilla group involved in the continuing Colombian conflict starting in 1964. The FARC-EP was officially founded in ...

(FARC) and

National Liberation Army (Colombia) The National Liberation Army (, ELN) is a far-left guerrilla insurgency group involved in the continuing Colombian conflict,

(ELN) guerrillas.

1992 coup d'état attempts

On November 27, 1992, Rodriguez Chacín was involved in the November 1992 attempted coup d'état (not to be confused with

Hugo Chávez Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (; ; 28 July 1954 – 5 March 2013) was a Venezuelan politician, Bolivarian Revolution, revolutionary, and Officer (armed forces), military officer who served as the 52nd president of Venezuela from 1999 until De ...

' February 1992 attempted coup). Rodríguez Chacín was jailed and served two years on charges of

treason Treason is the crime of attacking a state (polity), state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to Coup d'état, overthrow its government, spy ...

and

rebellion Rebellion is an uprising that resists and is organized against one's government. A rebel is a person who engages in a rebellion. A rebel group is a consciously coordinated group that seeks to gain political control over an entire state or a ...

Hugo Chávez government

With the election of

president of Venezuela The president of Venezuela (), officially known as the president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (), is the executive head of state and head of government of Venezuela. The president leads the National Executive of the Venezuelan go ...

in 1999, Rodríguez Chacín worked as his

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. It can be described as t ...

chief. Rodriguez Chacín was Minister of the Interior in 2002 (from January), being replaced in May 2002 by

Diosdado Cabello Diosdado Cabello Rondón (born 15 April 1963Vicepresidencia de la República Bolivariana de VenezuelaDiosdado Cabello Rondón, accessed 19 April 2010) is a Venezuelan politician who currently serves as Minister of Interior, Justice and Peace s ...

. In 2007 Rodríguez Chacín played a key role in organizing Operation Emmanuel, designed to fly into

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

and receive three Colombian hostages held by the FARC in the jungles as part of a plan to push the Colombian government for a humanitarian exchange of hostages for prisoners. According to the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'', the videotaped coverage of the hostage release showed minister Rodriguez Chacín telling

FARC The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army (, FARC–EP or FARC) was a Marxist–Leninist guerrilla group involved in the continuing Colombian conflict starting in 1964. The FARC-EP was officially founded in 1966 from peasan ...

rebels "We are with you... Be strong. We are following your cause." In January 2008 another liberation of four Colombian hostages by the

was managed by Rodríguez Chacín. Rodriguez Chacín was appointed Minister of the Interior for a second time in January 2008, replacing Pedro Carreño. Rodriguez Chacín, the Minister of Interior and Justice, stepped down on September 8, 2008: "For strictly personal grounds, I have decided to leave my job. President

, our Commander-in-Chief has decided that the new interim Minister will be my colleague and comrade, Tarek El Aissami" (who is now deputy minister of citizen security).

Allegations of links to FARC

The German magazine ''

Der Spiegel (, , stylized in all caps) is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of about 724,000 copies in 2022, it is one of the largest such publications in Europe. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...

'' reported in 2008 that Rodriguez Chacín was a frequent guest at

camps in

and that Hugo Chávez had assigned him the task of managing communications with FARC. In September 2008, The U.S. Department of the Treasury accused Rodriguez Chacín of materially assisting FARC's narcotics trafficking activities; the Venezuelan government said he was not guilty of those charges. US intelligence officials claimed that in an email between Rodriguez Chacín and the FARC leadership that he asked to train Venezuela's military in

guerrilla tactics Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, Partisan (military), partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include Children in the military, recruite ...

as preparation in case the United States invades. They also claimed that regarding an alleged 250 million dollar Venezuelan loan to buy weapons, Rodriguez Chacín wrote: "don't think of it as a loan, think of it as solidarity". The source for these documents was allegedly a 2008 cross-border raid by Colombian military into Ecuador which destroyed a FARC camp. Venezuelan Ambassador to the United States Bernardo Alvarez stated, "We don't recognized the validity of any of these documents... They are false, and an attempt to discredit the Venezuelan government." In 2008, the U.S.

Office of Foreign Assets Control The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is a financial intelligence and enforcement agency of the United States Department of the Treasury, United States Treasury Department. It administers and enforces economic and trade economic sanctions, ...

(OFAC) sanctioned three current or former Venezuelan government officials, including Rodríguez, saying there was evidence they had materially helped the

(FARC) in the

illegal drug trade The illegal drug trade, drug trafficking, or narcotrafficking is a global black market dedicated to the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of drug prohibition, prohibited drugs. Most jurisdictions prohibitionism, prohibit trade, exce ...

. The order "freezes any assets the designated entities and individuals may have under U.S. jurisdiction and prohibits U.S. persons from conducting financial or commercial transactions involving those assets".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chacin, Ramon Rodriguez 1951 births Living people Governors of Guárico Prisoners and detainees of Venezuela Ministers of interior of Venezuela Venezuelan prisoners and detainees People of the 1992 Venezuelan coup d'état attempts Venezuelan politicians convicted of crimes People convicted of treason Justice ministers of Venezuela Hugo Chávez ministers