cocaine shipments in Venezuela
The case against the former president also describes a scheme involving irregular contracts and corruption within Pdvsa.
A plane belonging to state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa) was allegedly used to transport drug shipments under the protection of the Bolivarian National Guard. According to a court filing submitted to a federal court in New York, the operation was linked to Nicolás Ernesto Maduro Guerra, known as “Nicolasito,” the son of Nicolás Maduro, and allegedly took place between 2014 and 2015 on the island of Margarita, Venezuela.
Maduro allegedly negotiated with ‘Timochenko,’ ‘Iván Márquez,’ and ‘Jesús Santrich’ to supply explosives to the FARC as payment for a drug-trafficking debt
The allegation appears in a 30-page superseding indictment filed on October 8, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. It describes Nicolás Maduro Moros and his wife, Cilia Flores, as allegedly participating in a drug-trafficking and corruption network that used public institutions to facilitate criminal operations.
The document, obtained by EL TIEMPO, devotes one section to explaining how Pdvsa, considered for decades the Venezuelan state’s main economic pillar, was allegedly used to facilitate activities related to international drug trafficking.
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In paragraph 13 of the indictment, U.S. prosecutors say that corruption was especially widespread at the state oil company and that some of its officials awarded contracts in exchange for illicit payments. According to the case file, the company’s own executives knew of these practices as a “state policy,” which investigators attribute to Maduro.
The indictment adds that “the theft, waste, incompetence, and corruption” spread throughout Pdvsa, while Venezuelan leaders used its resources to facilitate drug-trafficking operations.
It is in this context that the company’s aircraft is mentioned. U.S. investigators allege that, between 2014 and 2015, Maduro Guerra used an aircraft belonging to Pdvsa to transport drugs protected by the Bolivarian National Guard on Margarita Island.
Although the case file does not specify the aircraft’s registration, the amount of drugs transported, or the destinations of the flights, the allegation brings the oil company into the investigation into the alleged use of Venezuelan state resources for drug-trafficking activities.
In a footnote, prosecutors also point out that Maduro Guerra was charged in August 2025 with drug- and weapons-trafficking offenses as part of an earlier proceeding in the same case.
According to the case file, in 2017, officials from the General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (DGCIM) were ordered to transport weapons in exchange for cocaine shipments from the Bolivarian National Guard, destined for members of the FARC and the ELN.
The drug shipments, which typically filled three to four military trucks, were taken to a military base and a Venezuelan port before being sent out of the country.
In another section, prosecutors say these operations continued in subsequent years through flights authorized by military officials and clandestine flights intended to evade surveillance by authorities in South and Central America.
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The allegations involving Pdvsa are part of a broader investigation that, according to the document, places Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores within an alleged network that operated from 1999 to 2025.
U.S. prosecutors allege that both used their public offices to enable people in their inner circle to profit from drug trafficking and the misappropriation of state resources.
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