Russia sent a "golden plane" to Caracas
It brought 30 tons of Venezuelan gold from Moscow?
Stefczyk
January 31, 2019
Anna Wróbel (PAP)
Nicolás MaduroA Boeing 757 cargo plane flew twice in January between Moscow and Caracas - the independent "Novaya Gazeta" announced on Thursday, expressing the assumption, that the plane took the 30 tons of gold owned by Venezuela out of Russia, stored there until now.
Citing its sources in Dubai, "Novaya Gazeta" writes, that the gold was unloaded from the plane at that airport and containers with cash - American dollars - were loaded onto its deck. According to "Novaya Gazeta" about 30 tons of gold owned by Venezuela was in the Russian central bank until January 2019.
The market price of 30 tons of gold is about 1.2 billion USD - notes the independent publication. It points out, that there was a certain concurrence - President Nicolas Maduro announced on those days, that he is allocating 1 billion euros to a program for the development of Venezuelan cities, which is intended to transform that country into a Latin American tourist mecca.
The Boeing 757 cargo plane, which "Novaya Gazieta" is writing about, belongs to a company called Yerofey, registered in Khabarovsk in the Russian Far East. This is the only plane belonging to this company, the sole owner of which is a Russian citizen - reports the independent newspaper.
According to "Novaya Gazeta" the Boeing 757 took off from Moscow on January 29th and landed in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, from where with two stopovers (in Morocco and Cape Verde) it arrived in Caracas on January 30th at noon.
The Boeing 757 also took a similar route to Venezuela - through Dubai and Morocco - over January 18-19 and over January 21-23 it returned to Moscow, also through Dubai and Morocco. Route information is provided by the newspaper citing data from the Flightradar portal.
"Our sources in Dubai claim, that armored cars with collectors of the central bank of the United Arab Emirates were waiting for the Russian aircraft at the airport. The gold was unloaded from the plane and containers with dollars in cash were loaded onto it" - writes "Novaya Gazeta".
It reminds us, that until the fall of 2011 the majority of Venezuelan gold reserves was kept abroad at banks in Europe and the USA, wherefore then-president Hugo Chavez announced, that the gold would return to the country.
"As of November 2012, 57 tons of Venezuelan gold remained abroad, the majority of which was entrusted for storage to the central bank of Russia. Exactly that gold was probably loaded into the Russian Boeing 757 cargo plane at the Moscow airport of Vnukovo on January 18th and 28th," estimates the newspaper. In their opinion the Venezuelan ore was sold for cash in Dubai.
This information was reported by "Novaya Gazeta" due to a wave of reports on other aircrafts in connection with Russia, which - as the media maintain - were headed in recent days to Venezuela. One of them, the Boeing 777 of the Russian carrier Nordwind Airlines, took off at the beginning of the week without a crew to Caracas and returned on Thursday to Moscow.
