A collaborative journalism project on the economic and political relationship between Venezuela and China, patched together from official documents.
Since its opening in 2017, the Porsche Design Tower quickly became a symbol of luxury and ostentation in South Florida. Magnates from all over the world retreat behind the discretion of its tinted glass windows and virtually anonymous legal entities. But in recent days, two police investigations into illegal financial flows from abroad placed the building under an inconvenient spotlight. The justice just seized an apartment of over five million dollars from a Venezuelan agent.
The member of the US Cabinet, Wilbur Ross, is one of the owners of a company that provides maritime transport services to Pdvsa, a client that in 2015 contributed over 11 percent of the profits to his shipping company. Although the official had to get rid of his mercantile properties to hold his position, he kept a participation in that line of business through a complex offshore structure in the Cayman Islands. Thus, he did not only do business with chavista Venezuela, but also with an associate of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Both countries are subject to economic sanctions by Washington.
Esta es la crónica de un viaje para ninguna parte. Un esfuerzo de más de un año por localizar el acta de nacimiento de Nicolás Maduro, la pieza clave para zanjar la polémica sobre la verdadera nacionalidad del mandatario venezolano, llevó al equipo de Armando.info hasta lo único que tiene para mostrar el registro civil de la parroquia La Candelaria de Caracas: unas hojas digitalizadas. Más allá se extiende una tierra incógnita donde yace el documento original, de existir y según diversas versiones, dentro de una caja fuerte, tras la permanente invocación de “razones de seguridad de Estado”, y con una custodia personalizada en la que al menos cuatro cancerberos se dedican día y noche a obstaculizar el acceso a sus folios.
Cristóbal Jiménez's obsequious ballad honoring Maisanta, the ancestor of the late President Hugo Chávez, has a title that fits the stories of Diego Pérez Henao, once one of the world's most wanted drug traffickers, who had his hideout in a small ranch in the state of Barinas. The estate emerges as one of the best kept secrets. Several sources agree that the founder of the Norte Del Valle cartel (Valley's North cartel) was untouchable within the boundaries that belonged to Israel Ramón Chávez Aro, a relative of the Bolivarian chieftain.
The fine line that separates Norte de Santander and Venezuela hides burial grounds of disappeared people from both sides, victims of violence by illegal armed groups that move at ease between both countries. Their relatives travel through trails, sidewalks and even cemeteries on the Venezuelan side, in search of their missing ones, without the help of any government.
