Earlier this week, the head of Venezuela’s National Assembly, Henry Ramos Allup, denounced that 60 Cuban military officials are embedded among operational forces at the Fuerte Tiuna military complex — home of Venezuela’s Ministry of Defense — under the command of Cuban General Raul Acosta Gregorich.
This morning, the French investigative journal, Intelligence Online, reported that North Korea’s regime has sent a special forces contingent to Venezuela to help its embattled quasi-dictator, Nicolas Maduro.
Furthermore, how this arrangement stems from a confidential military cooperation and intelligence-sharing agreement that North Korea’s Kim Jong-un with Cuba’s Castro regime in March.
Of course, there’s more than a hint of irony that while President Obama was wining-and-dining in Cuba in March, that the Castro regime was signing a military and intelligence cooperation agreement with the North Korean regime.
Here’s the report from France’s Intelligence Online:
Kim Jung-un comes to Maduro’s aid
Observers are wondering just how involved the North Korean Praetorian Guard that Pyongyang has sent to assist Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro will become. Hugo Chavez’s successor has declared a state of emergency in the country while anti-government protests continue to mount. The man behind the ‘loan’ of North Korean troops is General Kim Yong-chol, who is close to the country’s Supreme Leader Kim Jung-un. The general is both head of the special forces and the United Front Work Department, or Tongil Chonsonbu, the intelligence service in charge of relations with friendly political movements.
North Korean special forces are training with their counterparts of Venezuela’s Grupo de Acciones Commando (GAC) and Chinese troops of the 21st Armed Group of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in Caracas this month.
Back in March, Pyongyang also signed a confidential military cooperation and intelligence-sharing agreement with Cuba, even though the latter is in the midst of a reconciliation process with the U.S.