Venezuelan paramilitary groups in Colombia prepare to launch cross-border raids
May 29, 2019 1 Comment
Groups of Venezuelan expatriates are reportedly forming armed militias in Colombia and say they are preparing to launch cross-border attacks to topple the government of President Nicolás Maduro in Caracas. It is believed that over a million Venezuelans have crossed the border into Colombia since 2016, when the ongoing economic crisis in Venezuela began to deepen. Among them are at least 1,400 members of various branches of Venezuela’s Armed Forces. Many of these defectors have declared their support for Juan Guaidó, the United States-supported President of the Venezuelan National Assembly, who has publicly called on the country’s Armed Forces to remove Maduro from power. According to a May 28 report by the Reuters news agency, some of these defectors are forming militias in Colombia and say they are preparing to launch cross-border attacks into Venezuela.
Reuters reporters spoke recently to eight Venezuelan defectors at an undisclosed location near the border between Colombia and Venezuela. The defectors said they represented a militia of 150 men, all of whom were had defected from the Venezuelan police force, army and intelligence services. One of the men identified himself as Eddier Rodriguez, 37, and said he now works as a private security guard in the Colombian city of Bogotá. He told Reuters that all 150 members of his militia were “willing to give our lives if necessary” to topple President Maduro. He added that his militia members had managed to arm themselves with handguns and were raising money to purchase more weapons and explosives. Rodriguez also claimed that his militia had been in contact with several Venezuelan “resistance groups” in Colombia, implying that his militia was not the only group of its kind. According to Rodriguez, his militia plans to coordinate with other similar groups to launch “Operation Venezuela”, an all-out cross-border attack against Venezuela, with the participation of “garrisons in Venezuela [which were] ready to fight once the operation began”.
Reuters said it was unable to independently verify the eight men’s claims about their militia group and other such groups in Colombia. However, reporters said they spoke with Victor Bautista, the Colombian Foreign Ministry’s director for border security, who assured them that the Colombian government “totally rejected” any attempts by armed groups to attack Venezuela. These groups would be considered “paramilitary organizations and would be detained by authorities If they were found”, Bautista told Reuters. The news agency also cited an anonymous Colombian intelligence official, who said that Colombia’s intelligence services had verified the existence of a number of Venezuelan paramilitary groups in the country. However, they “could not act against them because they had not yet committed any crimes”, he said.
► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 29 May 2019 | Permalink
Israeli intelligence was likely behind the leaked video that brought down the far-right governing coalition in Austria on Monday, according to the former deputy director of Germany’s spy agency. The surreptitiously recorded video was 
Jonathan Pollard, an American who spied on his country for Israel in the 1980s, and is now free after spending 30 years in prison, has spoken of his frustration with the Israeli government, which it claims has forgotten about him. Pollard, a former intelligence analyst for the United States Navy, was released from an American prison in 2015, after serving a lengthy sentence for selling US government secrets to Israel. Throughout Pollard’s time in prison, the government of Israel 
France’s domestic intelligence agency has summoned eight journalists for questioning in relation to two separate investigative reports, prompting concerns about press freedom, according to reports from Paris. Last month, France’s domestic security and counter- intelligence agency, the General Directorate for Internal Security (DGSI), summoned three journalists for questioning. The summonses related to a 
The West Africa province of the Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the killing 20 Nigerian soldiers and the execution of nine more soldiers that were captured in various operations, according to Reuters. The group behind the attacks emerged in 2002 under the name Boko Haram (“Western education is forbidden”), as part of a growing wave of anti-government sentiment in Nigeria’s Muslim-majority northern regions. In 2014, the group pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria —otherwise known as Islamic State. Since that time, Boko Haram has rebranded itself as Islamic State – West Africa Province, while a smaller faction of the group has refused to align itself with the ISIS and continues to operate under the name Boko Haram.
A new star that was recently added to the United States Central Intelligence Agency’s memorial wall is seen by some as a way to draw attention to the mental pressures that come with the job, while others view it as disrespectful to the Agency’s mission. The specially designated wall is located at the main entrance lobby of the CIA’s headquarters in Langley, Virginia. It was created in 1974 and displays a star for each of the CIA’s personnel who have perished in the line of duty while working for the Agency. Today it displays nearly 130 stars, which span the CIA’s 72-year history.
A day after Austria’s political system was thrown into a disarray by a covert video featuring the country’s vice chancellor and a woman posing as a Russian investor, German intelligence sources have raised fears that Russia may have penetrated the Austrian government with informants. Heinz-Christian Strache, who heads Austria’s far-right Freedom Party, stepped down from the post of vice chancellor on Saturday. His resignation came a day after two German media outlets aired a 
The escalating tension between the United States and Iran, and the ensuing military buildup in the Persian Gulf, may have resulted from a misreading of intelligence by both sides, according to a new report in The Wall Street Journal. Reports from the Middle East continue to describe the situation there as tense, while the political rhetoric by both Washington and Tehran remains heightened. Last week, the White House ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group to sail to Middle Eastern waters, following intelligence 
The group calling itself the Islamic State has announced the establishment of a new overseas province in Pakistan, just days after proclaiming another new overseas province in northern India. Until recently, the Islamic State’s operations in Asia were conducted under the banner of the Islamic State – Khorasan Province, or IS-KP. The shadowy group was founded in early 2015 and was led by former Taliban warlords who pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the spiritual leader and self-proclaimed emir of the Islamic State. Since that time, at least two of IS-KP’s leaders have been killed by United States forces, while the group has been engaged in a war against rival militant groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan, notably the Taliban.
The most senior British military officer in the war against the Islamic State contradicted American assessments of a heightened threat from Iran, prompting an unusually strong rebuke from Washington. Last week, the White House ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group to sail to Middle Eastern waters, following intelligence 
Authorities in the United Arab Emirates said on Sunday that four commercial ships were targeted by “sabotage operations”, but did not point to possible culprits. The announcement came hours after false reports circulated in Iranian and Lebanese media stating that explosions had been witnessed at the port of Fujairah, a major Emirati commercial shipping facility that borders the Sultanate of Oman and is visible from the coast of Iran. The alleged explosions were first 
The sudden decision by the United States to deploy significant firepower to the Middle East was partly in response to intelligence that was given to Washington by Israeli officials, according to a report. On Wednesday, the US announced that the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group had received instructions to sail to the Middle East. The aircraft carrier is 
In an effort to persuade senior members of the Venezuelan government to defect, the United States has lifted punitive financial sanctions on the country’s intelligence director, who left his post on April 30. General Christopher Figuera became director of the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN) in October 2018. SEBIN is Venezuela’s primary intelligence agency and has a dual domestic and international role. Much of its domestic mission is to protect and defend the Bolivarian Revolution, which forms the ideological framework of the government headed by President Nicolás Maduro. It follows that SEBIN’s employees are all trusted supporters of Venezuela’s embattled President.
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Pakistan sentences two, including senior military officer, to death for espionage
May 31, 2019 Leave a comment
The three men were identified as Lieutenant General Javed Iqbal, Brigadier (ret.) Raja Rizwan, and Dr. Wasim Akram, who was reportedly “employed at [an unidentified] sensitive organization”. Iqbal and Akram were sentenced to death, while Rizwan was sentenced to 14 years of “vigorous imprisonment”, according to ISPR. Reports in local media said that General Qamar Javed Bajwa, the Pakistani Army’s Chief of Staff, had approved the sentences handed to the men by the military judges. This means that the sentences will be carried out unless Pakistan’s President, Arif Alvi, pardons them. Interestingly, the ISPR statement noted that the three men were tried in separate military courts for separate cases. No further information was provided. As intelNews reported in February, Pakistani media claimed at the time that those arrested included a Pakistani official with diplomatic credentials who was serving in a Pakistani embassy “in a European capital”.
No information has emerged about the country or countries to which the alleged spies gave sensitive information. Back in February, Pakistan’s leading conservative daily, The News International, claimed that the spies’ handlers belonged to an intelligence agency of one of “the world’s most powerful countries”. The paper also hinted that the alleged spy network may have been working for the United States Central Intelligence Agency, but provided no information to support this claim. It added that the network had been “completely dismantled” following a counterintelligence operation that an unnamed source described to the paper as “remarkable”.
► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 31 May | Permalink
Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with counterintelligence, espionage, Inter-Services Public Relations (Pakistan), Javed Iqbal, News, Pakistan, Raja Rizwan, Wasim Akram