Article by Juan Camilo Jaramillo, InsightCrime | August 18, 2021 (Mentions SOSOrinoco)

This situation report is produced by the International Council of AIDS Service Organizations (ICASO) and Global Development One (GDO). It focuses on the malaria situation in Venezuela from January 2000 to June 2019, underscoring the role that the complex humanitarian crisis has played in more recent years. www.icaso.org

Far from being a legal activity that would bring in revenue to the National Treasury, the coltan mining operations are nothing more than an activity that is totally immersed in corruption and has as its purpose the enrichment of individuals: military officers, politicians, financial backers and technocrats, most of whom are partial to the regime, and members of the Colombian guerrilla forces, who use this as a way to finance the operations of their criminal organization. At the cost of causing highly deleterious impacts on society, this activity has no purpose other than to fill the pockets of these players and further promote their other illegal operations.

As the Maduro Regime attempts to maneuver around sanctions that are limiting its ability to produce revenues via PDVSA, they are trying to ramp up gold, diamond and coltan production, circumvent the Central Bank of Venezuela by smuggling these conflict minerals through Colombia, Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao and lately direct flights to Turkey, in order to export the minerals directly to Turkey and Iran.

Documentary by Miguel Yabrudes I October 28, 2018 (Spanish) I A documentary series about the Arco Minero del Orinoco, a major mining project and source of massive environmental devastation in Venezuela, which was approved by the Maduro government in 2016 in search of funds to stay in power.