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(CNN Spanish) - The Federal Police of Brazil issued 20 orders of preventive and temporary detention. One of them against the former president of Paraguay, Horacio Cartes. So far, the Brazilian Prosecutor's Office has not detailed what specific charges Cartes faces.
Operation Patron intends to dismantle a criminal network linked to the illegal money exchanger Dario Messer, arrested preventively in July after having been a fugitive for more than a year. Messer faces charges of money laundering, currency evasion and criminal organization. His defense has denied all charges.
Operation Patron identified about 20 million dollars, 17 million of them irregularly in a bank in the Bahamas and the rest pulverized among illegal money changers, regular exchange houses, businessmen, politicians and a lawyer in Paraguay.
CNN has not been able to communicate directly with the legal team of Cartes to obtain their comments on this order, but his lawyer, Carlos Palacios, told Radio Universo de Paraguay on Tuesday that they do not know “specifically the complaint of the Public Ministry that motivates this decision of the judge Brazilian".
“We are going to contact colleagues from Brazil so they can internalize the issue. First, to confirm if this information is true and if it is, to gather all the information to know the process and specifically what is the reason for this judicial resolution, ”Palacios told Paraguayan radio.
“Cartes always responded that he had no commercial and corporate ties with Messer. This has been emphatically denied. Cartes and Messer are not business partners, ”he added.
Horacio Cartes