The judge of the National Court Francisco de Jorge, replacing Santiago Pedraz, has agreed to decree provisional detention without bail and issue the European search and surrender order, as well as the international arrest warrant against Carmelo Ovono Obiang, Secretary of State of the Presidency of Equatorial Guinea and son of President Teodoro Obiang, for the kidnapping and torture of four opponents, one of them Spanish, who died in unclear circumstances.
The order also extends against the Minister of the Interior, Nicolás Obama and against Isaac Nguema Endo, Director of Security, investigated in the same case for the crimes of kidnapping and torture for terrorist purposes.
The magistrate's order, issued on Friday, thus complies with what was ordered by the Criminal Chamber of the Court when considering the appeal presented by the Movement for the Liberation of Equatorial Guinea-Third Republic (MLGE3R) to which the families of the victims against the resolution of Pedraz, the investigator of the investigation, who has repeatedly refused to issue the international arrest warrant against the dictator's son.
De Jorge has sent the testimony of his resolution along with the arrest warrants to Interpol, the security forces and the Sirene office (Request for complementary information at national entry), the center responsible for validating the descriptions of the people sought for his arrest.
Sirene has offices in all European capitals.
The new judicial order means that Carmelo Ovono, 44 years old, ex-military and responsible for the foreign security of Equatorial Guinea, cannot travel to any of the 196 countries that make up Interpol without risk of being arrested and extradited to Spain, where he is wanted. .
The Interpol central office in Lyon (France) has already included the highest priority red arrest warrant against the dictator's son and the other two senior Guinean officials.
Ovono Obiang has residence, properties, companies and accounts in Spain.
But he has not set foot in Spain since on December 29, 2022, Judge Pedraz ordered the Police to hand him over the complaint that was being processed against him.
Ovono was spending the night in a central hotel in Madrid, he took a plane to Malabo that same morning and has not returned.
Weeks before, the magistrate had ordered the agents to detain him at the Madrid-Barajas airport, where a police operation was awaiting him, transfer him to the National Court and seize his mobile phone and electronic devices.
Days later, Julio Obama, one of the four kidnapped opponents, died.
The magistrate has not explained in his records or rulings why this change in criteria was due.
An unexpected twist that has caused discomfort among police officers who secretly investigated the entire plot for two years.
Pedraz does not sign the order
The search and arrest order does not bear the signature of Pedraz, but of Francisco de Jorge, the substitute judge of the Court of Instruction Number 5, because the investigator of the case and owner began a few days of leave that same day, as indicated to this newspaper official sources of the National Court.
The request for permission was made before the Court ruled, according to the same source.
During the investigation that has lasted more than two years, Judge Pedraz has refused to issue the international search and arrest order to Interpol that prosecutor Vicente González Mota and the complainants have been demanding since last March.
Also, when the three investigated stood him down last March and did not come to give a statement by videoconference.
But, the foreseeable declaration of rebellion never came until the three magistrates of the Criminal Chamber forced the judge to issue international detention.
In the coming days, the Criminal Chamber will have to decide on the appeal presented by prosecutor Vicente González Mota and the legal representation of the victims' relatives against Pedraz's order by which he agreed to resign from investigating the case and cede jurisdiction to Equatorial Guinea.
The authorities of the former Spanish colony claim to have opened an investigation in the country against the three defendants.
The Equatorial Guinea authorities have refused to repatriate the body of Julio Obama despite the demand of the judge, his relatives and all the parties in the European Parliament.
Foreign Affairs does not know the whereabouts and state of health of the three missing people and for more than a year no Spanish representative has been allowed to visit them.
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