Luxury jet used by Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro seized by US officials

Published

2 weeks ago

September 3, 2024

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Venezuela’s equivalent to Air Force One has been seized by US officials, who claim the luxury presidential jet was bought illegally and smuggled out of the country to get around US export control laws.

The white Dassault Falcon 900EX, used by Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores during state visits, was seized in the Dominican Republic and flown to Florida, the US Justice Department said on Monday.

Registered in San Marino, the aircraft was used extensively for foreign trips by Mr Maduro and his senior officials, including trips to Guyana and Cuba earlier this year.

It landed at Florida’s Fort Lauderdale shortly before noon after being seized, according to flight tracking websites.

Washington has said the plane, valued at $13m (£10m), was bought from sellers in Florida in late 2022 and early the following year.

Officials have said the deal was done through a Caribbean-based shell company used to hide the involvement of associates of the Venezuelan leader.

According to officials, it was then exported to Caracas through the Caribbean in April last year, in an arrangement designed to get around an executive order barring Americans from making deals with anyone involved in Mr Maduro’s government.

US Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement that it had been smuggled out of the US for use by “Maduro and his cronies.”

Matthew Axelrod, from the US Commerce Department, said in a statement: “Let this seizure send a clear message: aircraft illegally acquired from the United States for the benefit of sanctioned Venezuelan officials cannot just fly off into the sunset.”

It’s less than a month since Mr Maduro was returned to office in a widely disputed presidential poll in which electoral authorities loyal to him declared the incumbent the winner without providing any detailed results.

The lack of transparency has been widely condemned by other countries.

Opponents of the Maduro regime obtained more than 80% of vote tally sheets, which suggested he had actually lost by a wide margin to former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez.

The plane was previously registered in the US and owned by Florida-based Six G Aviation, a broker that buys and sells used aircraft, according to several flight tracking websites.

It was exported to St Vincent and the Grenadines and de-registered in the US in January 2023, according to Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) records.

In March, it flew to the Dominican Republic, along with a Venezuelan-registered plane, for what was believed to be maintenance and had been there since.

Washington has already seized a Boeing 747-300 cargo plane transferred from Iran to a subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned airlines as well as several private jets belonging to Venezuelan officials sanctioned or charged in the US.

US

Titan submersible: New coastguard video shows wreckage on seafloor

Published

13 hours ago

September 19, 2024

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Titan submersible: New coastguard video shows wreckage on seafloor

New video has been released of the remains of the Titan submersible – more than 3700m down on the seafloor.

The US Coast Guard said it shows “the aft dome, aft ring, remnants of the hull and carbon fiber debris”.

It comes shortly after images of the sub’s tail were released.

A hearing is currently taking place in the US about the Titan’s fatal implosion on a trip to the Titanic in June 2023.

OceanGate’s former operations boss told the panel earlier this week the sub was a huge risk and the company was only focused on profit.

David Lochridge also painted an unflattering picture of the firm’s founder, Stockton Rush, saying he would “fly off the handle” and had a “total disregard for safety”.

In one incident, he said Mr Rush crashed the sub into a wreck site and threw the PlayStation controller used to pilot the vehicle at his head.

Three Britons died in the incident – adventurer Hamish Harding and father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood

Mr Rush and Frenchman Paul-Henri Nargeolet were also killed instantly when the craft was crushed by the pressure of the ocean.

OceanGate’s scientific director Steven Ross is expected to give evidence on Thursday, as is Renata Rojas, a mission specialist for the American company.

The firm suspended operations after the disaster and now has no full-time staff but is being represented by a lawyer during the US Coast Guard hearing.

Titan lost contact with its support ship on 18 June last year, prompting a search in the Atlantic that made global headlines.

However, the wreck was found four days later 300m from the Titanic’s bow. The sub had been making voyages to the site of the legendary shipwreck since 2021.

US

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs refused bail a second time as he faces sex trafficking charges

Published

1 day ago

September 18, 2024

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Sean 'Diddy' Combs refused bail a second time as he faces sex trafficking charges

Sean “Diddy” Combs has been refused bail a second time as he faces several charges including sex trafficking, drug possession and firearms offences.

US district judge Andrew L Carter said the government had proved “by clear and convincing evidence that there is no condition or set of conditions” that will ensure the safety of the community and that the rapper and music mogul will not tamper with witnesses.

The 54-year-old pleaded not guilty after he was first arrested by officers at the Park Hyatt hotel in Manhattan, New York, on Monday.

He was originally denied bail and told he would be detained after pleading not guilty to three felony counts during an initial court appearance on Tuesday.

Lawyers representing Combs asked a judge on Wednesday to let him await his trial at his luxury home on an island near Miami Beach, as opposed to in jail in Brooklyn.

But prosecutors argued against the proposal, saying there was too great a risk that Combs could threaten or harm witnesses.

Combs’s lawyers offered a $50m (£37.8m) bail package in exchange for his release to home detention with GPS monitoring and strict limitations on who could visit him.

Arguing to keep him behind bars, prosecutor Emily Johnson told the judge that Combs had a long history of intimidating both accusers and witnesses to his alleged abuse.

Ms Johnson cited text messages from women who said Combs forced them into “Freak Offs” and then threatened to leak explicit videos of them engaging in sexual acts.

She also said that Combs’s own defence team was “minimising and horrifically understating” his propensity for violence.

The defence and prosecution were wrangling over the request before the judge passed his ruling.

“I am feeling confident. We’re going to go get Mr Combs out of jail,” Combs’s lawyer Marc Agnifilo said on his way into court on Wednesday, before the judge decided Combs would spend his time before the trial at the Metropolitan Detention Center.

A legal indictment released after Combs’s arrest detailed allegations dating to 2008, accusing him of abusing, threatening, and coercing women for years “to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation, and conceal his conduct”.

He allegedly induced female victims and male sex workers into drug-fuelled sexual performances, dubbed “Freak Offs”, according to the report.

Combs, formerly known as Puff Daddy and P Diddy, was once one of the most influential figures in hip-hop – famous as a producer and manager of the late Notorious BIG, as well as a rapper in his own right for hits including I’ll Be Missing You, Come With Me, and Bad Boy For Life.

However, in November, his former girlfriend, the R&B singer Cassie, filed a lawsuit accusing him of coercing her, and others, into unwanted sex in drug-fuelled settings.

The suit was settled in one day, but months later CNN aired hotel security footage showing Combs punching and kicking Cassie and throwing her to the floor.

He apologised after the video aired, saying: “I was disgusted when I did it.”

US

Bumper US interest rate cut aims to boost flagging economy

Published

1 day ago

September 18, 2024

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Bumper US interest rate cut aims to boost flagging economy

US interest rates have been slashed for the first time in more than four years – by more than many expected – amid fears the world’s largest economy is flagging.

The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, brought interest rates down by 0.5 percentage points to 4.75% to 5%.

Unlike the UK, the US interest rate is a range to guide lenders rather than a single percentage.

Bringing down inflation to 2% is a primary goal of the Fed and it has used interest rates to draw money out of the economy by making borrowing more costly since 2022, when the Ukraine/Russia price shock hit.

Recent figures show the Fed is not far from its inflation target – with the main measure hitting 2.5% in August, the lowest rate in three years.

But signs of a weakening economy emerged last month as data on job creation led to recession fears.

The Fed signalled in its statement that while it was confident on both the inflation and growth outlooks, a slowdown in the pace of hiring was a cause for concern.

Only one member of its rate-setting committee dissented on the 0.5 percentage point reduction. Financial market participants had been split on whether it would go for the 0.25 option instead.

US stocks rallied in the wake of the decision, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average and broader S&P 500 both up by more than 0.5% from flat positions moments before the rate decision was revealed.

The dollar was trading a cent lower versus sterling at $1.32.

Some market analysts said the Fed’s move showed Fed chair Jay Powell and his fellow policymakers had been too slow to react to the employment slowdown.

He told reporters: “We’re going to be making decisions meeting by meeting, based on the incoming data and the evolving outlook, the balance of risks… it’s a process of recalibrating our policy stance away from where we had it a year ago, when inflation was high and unemployment low, to a place that’s more appropriate given where we are now and where we expect to be.

“That process will time time”, he added, saying there would be no “rush”.

Michael Sheehan, fund manager of fixed income at EdenTree Investment Management, said: “Kicking off this cutting cycle with a 50 basis point reduction will undoubtedly vindicate those who had argued that the Fed had fallen behind the curve.

“Any doubts that this cutting cycle would be any less dramatic than previous ones have been firmly laid to rest.

“We expect this larger cut of 50 basis points to boost risk assets in the short term. The key for markets, and indeed the Federal Reserve, will be how far the softening of the labour market has to run.

“Powell will be hoping that taking aggressive action early will go some way to curtailing a substantial weakening and achieve the elusive soft landing.”

What about the UK?

It comes as the UK central bank the Bank of England meets on Thursday to make its own interest rate decision.

While the Bank will focus on UK economic data – and on Wednesday afternoon was expected by markets to hold rates – it could be influenced by US decision-making.

Lower interest rates tend to weaken currencies, so a big cut from the Fed could be good news for the pound.

While being able to buy more dollars is good news for people holidaying in the US and paying for imports like oil, it’s bad news for exporters who get less for their goods as a result and have a less competitive product.

Lower exports can slow inflation, meaning the Bank could be more likely to cut.