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The businessman Alex Saab, long accused of being a frontman for Nicolás Maduro, was arrested in Venezuela early on Wednesday morning.
According to Caracol Radio, citing sources from U.S. intelligence, the capture, which took place around 2:00 a.m., was part of a joint operation between the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and is part of a cooperation process aimed at his extradition to the United States.
The information was also confirmed by Reuters, which reported on Wednesday the arrest of Alex Saab as part of a “joint operation between the United States and Venezuela,” citing a U.S. security official.
Saab, who was recently dismissed by Delcy Rodríguez, remains under the custody of SEBIN while the procedural steps are being determined.
In the same operation, Raúl Gorrín Belisario, a Venezuelan businessman and owner of the channel Globovisión, was also arrested. He has been identified as a frontman for Chavismo and has been sanctioned by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Department of the Treasury for paying millions in bribes to officials of the regime.
According to sources, both arrests are part of a judicial cooperation agreement between the governments of Caracas and Washington.
Alex Nain Saab Morán, born in Barranquilla on December 21, 1971, is a businessman of Lebanese origin who, since the early 2000s, has woven a network of business ties with Chavismo, primarily through the CLAP food program, which has been accused of serving as a mechanism for the diversion of public funds.
In 2018, he was appointed "special envoy of Venezuela" for diplomatic and humanitarian work, a status that Caracas has attempted to use to justify its immunity in the past.
Saab was first arrested in 2020 in Cape Verde and extradited to the United States in 2021, where he was charged with conspiracy to launder money and being part of an international corruption network that laundered hundreds of millions of dollars from contracts with the Venezuelan state.
In December 2023, he was released following a pardon from President Joe Biden, as part of a prisoner exchange with the Maduro government.
Subsequently, in March 2024, a federal court in Miami dismissed all charges against him.
Upon his return to Caracas, Saab was received as a hero by the regime and took up the Ministry of Industries and National Production in October 2024, a position from which he was removed weeks after Nicolás Maduro's capture, which occurred last month.
Since then, he had maintained a low public profile, although sources within chavismo regarded him as a key figure due to his knowledge of the financial circuits of the Venezuelan government.
The new arrest represents an unexpected turn in the relationship between Washington and Caracas, which had shown signs of rapprochement in recent months following the change of power in Venezuela.
If his extradition is confirmed, it would be the second judicial proceeding against Alex Saab in U.S. territory, this time in a completely different political context and with potential implications for future investigations into corruption within chavismo.
Caracol Radio stated that the efforts to transfer Saab to the United States are already underway and could be finalized in the coming hours.
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