Venezuela to Charge Opposition Leader in Alleged Plot to Kill President

By Kejal Vyas 

CARACAS--A leading opposition figure in Venezuela will be formally charged for what prosecutors are saying is her role in an alleged plot to kill President Nicolas Maduro, months after government critics dismissed the accusations as trumped up to silence the administration's foes.

Maria Corina Machado was summoned to appear in front of a judge here in the capital Dec. 3, the state prosecutor's office said in a statement Wednesday after an eight-month investigation.

Top Venezuelan officials in May announced that they had uncovered a plot to assassinate Mr. Maduro involving Ms. Machado, several other government critics and the U.S. ambassador to Colombia, allegations that the accused parties have all denied. The president's allies had displayed emails allegedly sent among those in the group as evidence of the conspiracy in a presentation broadcast on all national television channels.

But a month later, a cybersecurity forensics expert hired by Pedro Burelli, a former director of Venezuela's state oil company who lives in the U.S. and was among those accused in the plot, said the emails cited by the Venezuelan government appeared to have been faked. The expert had used data provided by Google after Mr. Burelli went to court to obtain the email information in an attempt to clear his name.

"We reject the accusation completely and the fact that the allegations are fake was already certified by the Google data," Tomás Arias, a lawyer for Ms. Machado said Wednesday. He said that Ms. Machado will announce Thursday whether she will participate in the court proceedings but added that the former congresswoman "has always shown face."

Ms. Machado gave a nine-hour testimony to prosecutors in June in relation to the alleged assassination plot and has been prohibited from leaving the country since then.

Ms. Machado and other opposition leaders say the accusations are false and are efforts by Mr. Maduro's government to stifle political rivals as well as distract from the country's economic turmoil, which polls show has led the president's approval rating to slip to a record low of 30%.

Among the most vocal critics of Venezuela's leftist regime, Ms. Machado promoted large protests earlier this year aiming to push Mr. Maduro from office as activists took the streets to voice their frustration with a collapsing economy, rampant violence, as well as what they say is government corruption and mismanagement. The demonstrations kicked off in February but tapered off by June as clashes between protesters and state security forces cost more than 40 lives.

Ms. Machado was stripped of her congressional seat amid the protests and after she attended a meeting of the Organization of American States in Washington, at the request of Panama, to call attention to the government's crackdown on protesters. Pro-Maduro parliamentarians, who dominate the National Assembly, subsequently voted to ban Ms. Machado from the legislative body, saying she violated Venezuela's constitution by speaking at the OAS.

Another opposition leader, Leopoldo Lopez, has been held in a military prison outside Caracas since February on charges of inciting violence during the anti-government protests. Last month, Mr. Lopez, who says he is a political prisoner, refused to participate in a court hearing, demanding that Venezuela agree to a United Nations' resolution calling for his release. He has denied the charges against him.

Write to Kejal Vyas at [e-mail]

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