Attorney General Luisa Ortega Díaz

Venezuela’s Attorney General Luisa Ortega Díaz said on Monday during an interview released in Lima, Peru, that subordination of the judiciary to secret services has turned Venezuela into a police state, instead of one with advocacy of citizens’ rights.

“Here (in Venezuela), carts go in front of horses, Sebin (the Venezuelan National Intelligence Service) gives the guidelines to the judiciary and this obeys. This is not Rule of Law, but a police state,” she told daily newspaper El Comercio.

The Attorney General said again that the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ) trespassed on the National Assembly with a number of judgments that meant rupture of the constitutional order, Efe quoted.

“Should the Constituent Assembly be materialized, we, Venezuelans, would start live the darkest hours in all our republican history. Should this project be consolidated, democracy would be finally dismantled,” she admonished.

Pro-government Deputy Pedro Carreño filed the petition last week, contending alleged gross negligence by Attorney General Luisa Ortega Díaz, admitted a request for a preliminary hearing to bring criminal charges.

According to Carreño, the Attorney General, at odds with a constituent assembly called by Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, “is taking a stance that puts peace in jeopardy.”