Prosecutor Alejandro Machado decided cite as investigators to the Minister of the Interior, Luis Alberto Heber, and Foreign Minister Francisco Bustillo by delivery of the passport to the Uruguayan drug trafficker Sebastian Marset.
In turn, as he learned The ObserverThey were too The former Vice Chancellor Carolina Ache, who resigned from the portfolio after the controversy over the delivery of the passport, and the Undersecretary of the Interior, Guillermo Maciel, as well as other officials who intervened in the passport process. That they be cited as investigated does not mean that they are to some degree guiltybut this allows them attend with a lawyer, explained the spokesman for the Prosecutor’s Office, Javier Benech. The declarations will be from August 1st.
In June, Ache revealed that shortly before the August 2022 interpellation, Foreign Minister Francisco Bustillo was aware of his exchange with the Undersecretary of the Interior, Guillermo Maciel, where he warned about the danger of drug trafficker Sebastián Marset. That exchange took place in November 2021 when the drug trafficker detained in Dubai was processing a passport for having been arrested when entering with a false Paraguayan document.
“At the time of the interpellation, we all had the information (about that exchange)“, assured Ache interviewed this Monday by Desayunos Informales.
“Hello Caro, we can know what happened to this criminal arrested in Dubai for a false document. It is a very dangerous and heavy drug“, the Undersecretary of the Ministry of the Interior, Guillermo Maciel, wrote to his counterpart in the Foreign Ministry, Carolina Ache, on November 3, 2021. “To know if he is still detained or they released him, which would be terrible,” he adds. “I’ll find out,” was the response of the then vice-chancellor.
Bustillo had said in Parliament, in August 2022, that “nobody knew” who Sebastián Marset was when the passport was processed.
Then in his appearance in June 2023, before the International Affairs commission, the chancellor said that he ratified what was done and said in Parliament in August 2022. “I did not miss the truthwhen I talked about the passport delivery process to Sebastián Marset (…) Nobody knew who Marset was in November, ”he said.
The foreign minister said that he had launched an administrative investigation once he learned of those exchanges between Ache and Maciel where they warned about a very dangerous drug trafficker. This decision was adopted before the interpellation since in that instance it was announced in Parliament. From the Foreign Ministry they said that Bustillo found out the day before from the parliamentary body.
“Almost a year after the processing and subsequent delivery of the passport began, I became aware of this exchange (between Maciel and Ache) – as we all did – and I immediately ordered an administrative investigation that revealed that this WhatsApp exchange had had no incidence. some in the processing of the passport, ”he explained this Wednesday.
Heber also knew
At that time, the Minister of the Interior, Luis Alberto Heber, also said that he was aware of the communications between Ache and Maciel and, therefore, was aware of the danger of Marset.
“Whoever writes (to Ache) is the undersecretary, how can I not know (about those messages),” said the minister in Arriba Gente.
In other words, while the Heber passport was being processed, Maciel and Ache were aware of the dangerousness of the drug trafficker but, according to what they say, they did not know about the process that Marset was carrying out before the ministries they lead, since both portfolios intervened.
