American, 2 more accused of powerjacking Venezuela

An American, a Colombian and a Spanish citizen has been accused by the Nicolas Maduro government of carrying out alleged "attacks" on the country's electricity grid in March.

The Interpol was asked on Tuesday to capture all three. Already five people were in custody for the March 7 attacks, the Caracas government said.

The Maduro government has also accused that the US and the domestic opposition staged the cyber-attack on the electricity grid and used a long-range sniper rifle to attack the Guri plant, knocking out power to almost the entire country.

However, experts say that the power failures were due to poor maintenance of the electric plants and a lack of investment in the system.

In his remarks to state-run VTV television, Communications Minister Jorge Rodriguez said that the Maduro government has asked Interpol to arrest Miguel Angel Jose Freitas, who "currently lives in Colombia" and works at "a cybersecurity company" .

Besides, Julio Cesar Acuna Nunez of the US and Ramon Oswaldo Garcia in Spain, was also named.

The Minister also said that five people have already been booked for paralyzing the country's electricity grid for five days.

The minister said that from March 7 through Tuesday the National Electric System (SEN) has suffered more than "45 attacks of a minor nature", adding that in the last two years more than 50 per cent of the country's more than 500 electric sub stations have been "sabotaged" and have experienced fires.

--IANS

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