![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-1.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Screenshot of the website of Postar Intertrade Ltd.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-2.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Screenshot of the website of Postar Intertrade Ltd.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-3.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Image distributed by the U.S. Department of the Treasury next to the announcement of sanctions against Samark L\u00f3pez<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-4.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Image of the samarklopez.org website<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\nOn \r\nNovember 19, a ship berthed in the port of Puerto Cabello - the main terminal of \r\nthe country, located in the state of Carabobo - with the holiday cargo. The pine \r\ntrees were dispatched by Postar Intertrade Limited to the Venezuelan Foreign \r\nTrade Corporation (Corpovex), a state-owned company responsible for centralizing \r\npublic purchases, chaired since its birth in 2013 by Giuseppe Yoffreda, a Major \r\nGeneral of the Venezuelan Air Force.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\nport records reveal that the Christmas trees, coming from the port of \r\nPhiladelphia, U.S.A., weighed together almost 58 tons. Corpovex does not publish \r\nor reveal information about the purchases made, but whoever follows the trail of \r\nPostar Intertrade Limited will run into the now infamous Samark \r\nL\u00f3pez.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
On \r\nthe web where Samark L\u00f3pez responded to OFAC, admitting that he \"has known \r\nTareck El Aissami for several years\" and denying being \"involved in drug \r\ntrafficking,\" the businessman mentions that in addition to Profit Corporation \r\nand Yakima Trading Corporation \u2014included in the list of the 13 assets blocked by \r\nthe U.S. Department of the Treasury, Postar Intertrade Limited is also his. \r\n\"Founded in 2013, Postar has a modern warehouse the size of three football \r\nfields, where the trucks line up for national distribution. Today, Postar \r\nemploys three thousand people and leads the way as a model of success in the \r\nVenezuelan private company.\" The portal also specifies that the company is \r\nengaged in the supply of building materials for social interest \r\nhomes.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\nversion on the Postar Intertrade Limited website is different. \"We specialize in \r\nbulk commodities trading and add value through our logistics and management \r\nservice portfolio.\" In the contact information, there is hardly a reference to \r\nan office in New York, an email and a telephone number.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
Samark \r\nL\u00f3pez does not appear in the company's papers. That may be the reason why Postar \r\nIntertrade Limited did not fall on the OFAC list known on Monday, February 13. \r\nBut the persons and addresses associated with Postar Intertrade Limited lead to \r\nwhom the U.S. Government presented to the world as the figurehead of the Vice President of \r\nVenezuela and former Governor of the State of Aragua.<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-5.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Cargo Manifest where the name of Amaury Salazar appears as head of Postar Intertrade Ltd.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-6.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Screenshot of the Venezuelan Social Security showing the relationship between Amaury Salazar and Profit Corporation, a company of Samark L\u00f3pez<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-7.jpg\")
<\/div><\/div>Facade of \"The Phoenix Center\" on the Island of Barbados<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-8.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Samark L\u00f3pez identity card, photocopy attached to the Mercantile Registry of Profit Corporation<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-9.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Mercantile Registry of Profit Corporation<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-10.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Minute of the Shareholders\u2019 Meeting mentioning Samark L\u00f3pez as new partner in Profit Corporation<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\nNo Documents<\/h2>\n\n\n
Postar \r\nIntertrade Limited has no domicile in Venezuela, nor is it registered in the \r\nNational Registry of Contractors (RNC), an essential requirement to do business \r\nwith the Government. To find the headquarters of Postar Intertrade Limited \r\nyou have to travel to The Phoenix Center, on the Caribbean island of Barbados, \r\nas evident in one of the cargo manifests of its shipments to \r\nCorpovex.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\nbond with Samark L\u00f3pez is established in several ways. The businessman used the \r\nsame address to move his company Yakima Trading Corporation from Panama, where \r\nit was founded in 2002, to Barbados, in early 2016.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\ncargo documents identify Amaury Salazar as head of Postar Intertrade Limited. \r\nThis is Amaury Jos\u00e9 Salazar Gibory, an employee of Profit Corporation, the \r\nbusiness pivot through which Samark L\u00f3pez entered into many contracts with the \r\nstate-owned Petr\u00f3leos de Venezuela (Pdvsa), since when he had the stock control \r\n(as of 2010), he added it to the \"Program of Social Production Companies (EPS)\" \r\nof the oil company and its subsidiaries, devised by the Government of Hugo \r\nCh\u00e1vez. The Venezuelan Institute of Social Security (IVSS) reveals that Amaury \r\nSalazar joined Profit Corporation, now questioned by OFAC, on September 1, \r\n2010.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
Amaury \r\nSalazar is a relative of Armando Jos\u00e9 Salazar Gibory, who was, for a while, a \r\npartner of Samark L\u00f3pez at Profit Corporation and also works at the company \r\nsince May 1, 2010. The record of the National Registry of Contractors (RNC) \r\nindicates that Armando Salazar is still the \"head\" of the company, located at \r\nthe exclusive Torre JWM, in El Rosal area, Caracas, where this week the press \r\nunsuccessfully looked for answers from those responsible for the sanctioned \r\ncompanies.<\/p>\n\n\n
\"Barbados is the best of two worlds. It is a clean, serious jurisdiction, inexpensive and, due to its British influence, allows the concept of Trust, a sort of legal anonymity\"<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n
An \r\nadditional piece of evidence proves the link between Samark L\u00f3pez and Postar \r\nIntertrade Limited, the trader of Christmas trees. The management of a company \r\nthat Amaury Salazar owns in Caracas, called Distribuidora Amaury and \r\ndisqualified from contracting with the Government, is the same used by Grupo \r\nSahect, C.A., with which Samark L\u00f3pez started in the food business years ago, \r\nand that was related to the \"Pudreval\" case, where thousands of tons of food \r\nimported by the State decomposed. Today, for the U.S. Department of the \r\nTreasury, Grupo Sahect is among Lopez's suspicious assets.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
Postar \r\nIntertrade Limited\u2019s domicile being in the island of Barbados is not hazardous. \r\nIn the organizational chart of properties that the U.S. Department of the \r\nTreasury attributes to Samark L\u00f3pez, there are companies in Venezuela, U.S.A., \r\nPanama, the British Virgin Islands and the United Kingdom, but none in Barbados. \r\n\"It is a serious jurisdiction, with predictable case law, and a legal structure \r\ninspired by the English Common Law system,\" describes Hernando D\u00edaz-Candia, a \r\nlawyer specialized in international arbitration and investment \r\nprotection.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
Precisely \r\nbecause of these characteristics, the jurisdiction of Barbados offers numerous \r\nadvantages to entrepreneurs like Samark L\u00f3pez. \"Barbados is the best of two \r\nworlds. It is a clean, serious jurisdiction, inexpensive and, due to its British \r\ninfluence, allows the concept of Trust, a sort of legal anonymity,\" says a \r\nsource, who prefers to remain anonymous.<\/p>\n\n\n
\"He is obviously very well advised\"<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n
The \r\nisland-state is not considered a \"tax haven\" by Seniat, the Venezuelan tax \r\nagency, because it has a \"treaty to avoid double taxation on income tax in \r\nVenezuela,\" and it signed a \"bilateral treaty on the promotion and protection of \r\ninvestments,\" which would allow investors to initiate arbitrations against \r\nVenezuela in the event that the Government incurs in\" non-compensated \r\n\"expropriation proceedings.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
\"He \r\nis obviously very well advised,\" the source concludes, referring to the domicile \r\nof Postar Intertrade Limited and Samark L\u00f3pez\u2019s decision to move his company \r\nYakima Trading Corporation from Panama to Barbados last year, when the storm was \r\ncoming from the isthmus of the Panama Papers, the journalistic investigation \r\nbased on the filtering of millions of documents from the Mossack Fonseca law \r\nfirm.<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-11.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Website of Yakima Trading Corp<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/19022017-12.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Website of Profit Corporation<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\"Today, \r\nBarbados is cleaner than Panama. United States of America watches more closely a \r\nPanamanian company than one in Barbados wanting to open accounts in American \r\nbanks,\" insists the source.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
A \r\nbusinessman, who also wanted to remain anonymous, recalls that, years ago, \r\nYakima Trading Corporation was mentioned in the case of an import of \r\ncontaminated milk from China, which splashed Samark L\u00f3pez. Not being in the \r\npapers of Postar Intertrade Limited could avoid such an \r\nevent.<\/p>\n\n\n
Business comes in Boxes<\/h2>\n\n\n
The \r\nexchange of Postar Intertrade Limited with Corpovex does not limit to Christmas \r\ntrees. Coincidentally, when the accusation by the U.S. Government against Tareck \r\nEl Aissami and Samark L\u00f3pez came from Washington, a ship with tons of food had \r\nbeen unloaded in the port of Puerto Cabello. The common thread of both stories, \r\nwhich occurred on February 13, is Postar Intertrade Limited. While the U.S. \r\nDepartment of the Treasury announced the sinking of dozens of assets and \r\ncompanies of Samark L\u00f3pez, the businessman began another business in Venezuelan \r\nwaters with the Venezuelan Government.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
While \r\nthe rumble came from the U.S. capital, at the time in the middle of winter, \r\nhundreds of the longed-for boxes of food that the Government sells through the \r\nLocal Supply and Production Committees (CLAP) \u2014an emergency plan that began to \r\ntake shape in late 2015 to address the general shortage of basic products\u2014, \r\ntrapped since February 10 in the warm Puerto Cabello, were unloaded from the San \r\nAntonio ship coming from the Mexican port of Veracruz.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
\"A \r\ntotal of 633 containers with food kits aimed for the CLAPs were unloaded from \r\nthe vessel San Antonio, at Pier 24, in Puerto Cabello,\" reported the Bolivarian \r\nState of Ports (Bolipuertos) on February 11. The 11,600 tons of boxes were \r\ndispatched by Postar Intertrade Limited, received by the also state-owned \r\nCorporaci\u00f3n de Abastecimiento y Servicios Agr\u00edcolas (CASA) -attached to the \r\noffice of the Minister of Food, General Rodolfo Marco Torres- and paid by \r\nCorpovex. Some sources indicate that this cargo is \"minor\" if compared to the \r\nvolumes of bulk foods that Samark L\u00f3pez and his companies also sell to \r\nCASA.<\/p>\n\n