Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Venezuela and state-sponsored terrorism


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎__EXPECTED_UNCONNECTED_PAGE__. A dramatic improvement in sourcing during the AfD shifted consensus into Keep territory. A separate discussion about a possible merger into another page can continue on the article's Talk page. Owen&times; &#9742;  13:53, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

Venezuela and state-sponsored terrorism

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Article has one citation, is extremely undue as it suggests disputed social groups known as colectivos are terrorist in nature and relies solely on the opinion of the Venezuelan opposition. No other groups or states make the suggestions made in this article. WMrapids (talk) 05:34, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Politics, Terrorism,  and Venezuela.  WC  Quidditch   ☎   ✎  06:03, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Military and Colombia. NoonIcarus (talk) 06:42, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep I have drastically expanded the article to include support to the FARC and ELN Colombian guerrilla groups, which was something that I planned to do but postponed.
 * With that being said, the content clearly meets WP:GNG and there's information that goes back decades and is clearly notable. I would ask the editor to consider withdrawing the nomination after these changes. --NoonIcarus (talk) 06:46, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I explained on the talk page, your addition was quite hasty and sloppily copied from a Spanish Wikipedia article. The sources you provided failed verification and did not support what you were trying to introduce. As I said in my conclusion, if we have some independent, reliable sources providing the same information, then that would be more appropriate and a withdrawal of my nomination would be considered. WMrapids (talk) 07:15, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
 * It would help if you provided more details about this. At any rate, and while I work in improvements, it's clear that the article meets WP:BEFORE. --NoonIcarus (talk) 15:23, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

Relisting comment: There is no consensus. Are there changes to the article and page title, removing "terrorism" that could be done through editing? Or do those editors arguing Delete see this as a TNT situation? Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 06:44, 29 February 2024 (UTC) Relisting comment: Further input is clearly necessary. Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, CycloneYoris talk! 06:55, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep per NoonIcarus. Meets WP:GNG. 23.156.104.104 (talk) 05:02, 27 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment There's a notable absence of sourcing - is there secondary peer-reviewed work on this? Leaving aside the geopolitical nature of the list, Venezuela has never been on the US State Department's List of State Sponsors of Terrorism. Accusations of this nature could be covered under United States–Venezuela relations. Regards,--Goldsztajn (talk) 08:45, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Delete In the absence of reliable secondary sources discussing this topic in any detail, it does not meet notability requirements. At the moment the article is plagued by POV issues as well. AusLondonder (talk) 22:26, 28 February 2024 (UTC)
 * When you refer to the absence of secondary sources, do you mean to the original version or in general? I have expanded the article, you can let know your thoughts here, including about neutrality. --NoonIcarus (talk) 15:54, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
 * Delete, should be added in to a different larger article 109.255.35.74 (talk) 14:26, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment Do you mean the current version or the article or overall? I'll leave here the original expansion that I proposed here to improve the issues:
 * There are several academic works that cover this issue:
 * Since May 2006, the Secretary of State has made an annual determination that Venezuela was not cooperating fully with United States antiterrorism efforts" (...) As a result, the United States imposed an arms embargo on Venezuela, which ended all U.S. commercial arms sales and re-transfers to Venezuela
 * 2006. In a hearing before the US Congressional Sincommittee on International Terrorism and Nonproliferation, a State Department official justified the embargo on grounds of official concern about Chávez overall actions against terrorism, his public statements in international forums addressing terrorism, his ties with states sponsoring terrorism, and his conduct towards terrorist organizations
 * : a country like Venezuela could easily be added to the list of state sponsors of terrorism
 * : [t]he Department of Treasury sanctioned dozens of government and military officials for charges including support for terrorism, drug and human trafficking, human rights violations, corruption, money laundering, other financial crimes, and illiberal behavior.
 * Investigative outlet Insight Crime has also written the following in the past:
 * Venezuela is a vital base of operations for dissidents from the former Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – FARC).
 * For decades, Venezuela had been a safe haven for leaders of the FARC, whose insurgent war to overthrow the Colombian government began in the 1960s. Senior commanders such as Duarte could live free from fear under the protection of the Venezuelan state led by President Hugo Chávez and later his successor Nicolás Maduro. But Duarte was the fourth senior ex-FARC commander assassinated in Venezuela in the space of a year.
 * Colombian guerrilla group the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – ELN) has used Venezuelan territory for decades, but its presence in the country has become increasingly important since 2000 as its Colombian operations have been squeezed by paramilitary groups and security forces. This coincided with the arrival of former Venezuela President Hugo Chávez in 1999. Chávez’s rise to power and his idea of ​​a socialist model for Venezuela was the ELN’s entry point. The political platform of the late president shared similar ideas with the ELN. This would eventually benefit the ELN and other guerrilla groups in Colombia.
 * Two leaders of Spain’s Basque separatist group hiding out in Venezuela allegedly receive salaries from state entities, marking the latest accusations that the Venezuelan government aids and abets terrorist organizations.
 * The issue has been covered by scholars and journalists, and not just politicians. The evidence mostly points out to the FARC and ELN guerrilla groups, designated as terrorist organizations by many organizations and countries, so most accusations actually have come from Colombia and not from the United States. --NoonIcarus (talk) 11:32, 29 February 2024 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * Comment After the article's expansion, the reason for the nomination is moot. The page has 24 references now, and now it doesn't cover just the position of the National Assembly, but also that of intelligence agencies, journalists and experts. The article should be kept. --NoonIcarus (talk) 21:13, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment The problem with the article at present is that it is essentially an unnecessary WP:FORK of a geopolitical dispute between the US and the current Venezuelan government, which as I said above, should be covered in the Venezuela-US relations article. If this is to exist as a separate artilce and not suffer from COATRACK and UNDUE issues, it needs to cover *all* aspects of the topic, that is the various sponsoring states and historically. Some examples of missing topics:
 * 1) When Dominican Republic President Trujillo organised an assassination attempt on President Betancourt in 1960.
 * 2) Betancourt's support for the Kennedy administration's assassination plots against Castro in the early 1960s
 * 3) US support for counter-insurgency in the 1960s
 * 4) Allegations from Philip Agee that in 1963 the CIA planted arms in Venezuela to appear to be from Cuba (CIA now claims was Cuban)
 * 5) Claims of US state terrorism around the 2002 attempted coup.
 * 6) Claims of US role in 2020 coup attempt
 * 7) Further 2020 plots of terrorism

Personally, I see this article as a Pandora's Box for drama - the only NPOV way for it to be maintained is that all incidents deemed terrorism supported by a state are essentially relevant...and we go down the rabbit hole of what constitutes terrorism, who deems it terrorism and which source is really independent ... ad nauseum. Regards, --Goldsztajn (talk) 11:34, 10 March 2024 (UTC)


 * (opening Pandora's Box) - Insight Crime is a Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, Department of State funded organisation, having recieved almost US$1 million from the US government since 2019. Regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 11:49, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Venezuelan Minister Calls US Sanctions 'Economic Terrorism' Voice of America, September 12, 2019. Economic state terrorism is state terrorism. I'm not trying to be facecious, just that if kept, this is the direction this article will also necessarily have to go. Regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 12:02, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * "We find that the sanctions have inflicted, and increasingly inflict, very serious harm to human life and health, including an estimated more than 40,000 deaths from 2017–2018". Economic Sanctions as Collective Punishment: The Case of Venezuela By Mark Weisbrot and Jeffrey Sachs, Center for Economic and Policy Research, 2019. Goldsztajn (talk) 12:23, 10 March 2024 (UTC)


 * While I understand the gist of your point, the scope of the article currently seems very clear and we're talking about different things: this page is about the confirmed or reported support from the Venezuelan state to terrorist organizations (not to be confused with state terrorism, which would be acts conducted by the state itself). This is consistent with other articles with the same convention: Iran, Israel, Pakistan, Qatar and even the United States themselves. If anything, in the case of the Assassination attempt of Rómulo Betancourt Venezuela was a victim of arguably state sponsored terrorism, and not a sponsor itself.


 * Most of what you're describing falls under the scope of the United States and state terrorism and United States and state-sponsored terrorism articles, which already covers topics such as the 1976 Cubana de Aviación Flight 455 bombing, for instance. Yes, there can be content covered at the United States–Venezuela relations article, but over half of the current content is related to Colombia and not the US, and that would be without going into details about relations with Spain (ETA) or the Middle East (Hezbollah). Even without taking into account investigations by Insight Crime, there is plenty of reporting by newspapers of record such as El País, El Mundo and CNN, as well as Venezuelan journalists and activists. This topic is notable and extensive enough on its own to warrant its own article.


 * Last but not least, is these concerns are issues that need to be fixed, thegy definitely fall under WP:BEFORE. Problems about content can be fixed through expansion or editing, not with deletion. --NoonIcarus (talk) 12:48, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * "the scope of the article currently seems very clear" ... according to you, but that's just an assertion. If the article is only about a geopolitical dispute between the US and Venezuela then this can be covered in the article on relations between the countries. If the article is about state-sponsored terrorism and Venezuela then we need it all. One can only argue keep on the basis that the article covers all matters related to state sponsored terrorism and Venezuela. One can argue delete on the basis that an article on the geopolitical dispute between the countries is redundant, a fork and already able to be covered in the US-Venezuela relations article.  It's one or the other. Regards, Goldsztajn (talk) 13:29, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The scope is ultimately decided by the community, to prevent original research. And once again: most content is unrelated to the geopolitical conflict between the US and Venezuela. Best wishes, --NoonIcarus (talk) 20:48, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * A lot of the claims you suggest would need to be included and would open the "Pandora's box" would not need to be included, either because they are not cases of state sponsorship of terrorism (1.-4.) or require taking Venezuelan government claims at face value (the rest), something even the cited articles do not do. Allan Nonymous (talk) 16:08, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

After reviewing this great outline by (following their opening of Pandora's Box), it seems clear that NoonIcarus is attempting to create a POV fork article, especially since they arbitrarily determined that these are no longer allegations in the National Liberation Army (Colombia) and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia articles. The majority of these sources are from adversarial governments (Colombia and the US) or from "independent" sources funded by one of the former. Despite the changes, I continue to believe that this article needs to be deleted and its content should be placed in more appropriate articles.--WMrapids (talk) 06:49, 12 March 2024 (UTC) Relisting comment: Final relist. Several comments. Please do not misuse WP:BEFORE, this is a process that occurs by the nominator before the AFD is started, not during the AFD. Read the policy. Second, an assessment of the sources brought up here would be useful for the closer, whomever that is. Finally, do not veer into a discussion of the subject matter here, that can happen if there is a decision to Keep this article on the article talk page and just serves to double and triple the size of this AFD which can discourage new participation (which is what we need right now). We could really use three or four of our AFD regulars assessing this article, in light of policy and the sources supplied. Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 06:25, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm very dissapointed at this comment because you specifically said that "[i]f we can have independent, reliable sources documenting Venezuela's support for FARC and the ELN, I would remove my nomination". The backpedalling is very clear and ignores the work of journalists such as those from Venezuela, CNN or El País. --NoonIcarus (talk) 13:57, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * Keep – The article was appropriately expanded during the discussion with several sources. I don't see anything really consistent arguing for deletion, and sources contradictory to the main body of the scope can also be added in a dedicated session. Svartner (talk) 05:29, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Gonna lean decisively towards keep here, mainly because this article is about a significant policy the Venezuelan government has perused for which there is pretty compelling evidence for. The decisive factor here is that the original editor's argument with regards the veracity of the sources of the article is marginal. The FARC and ELN are not necessarily terrorist organizations, but both have certainly engaged in narco-terrorism, not to mention, there's this guy: Tareck El Aissami. Allan Nonymous (talk) 12:30, 22 March 2024 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.