MIAMI, May 19, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - Venezuela's former minister of industry appeared in a US court Monday to face money laundering charges under accusations of being a front man for deposed president Nicolas Maduro.

Alex Saab, a 54-year-old Colombia-born businessman and close ally of Maduro's, appeared in US federal court in Miami where he was indicted on charges he oversaw a network that exploited a subsidized food aid program for Venezuela known as CLAP.

"Alex Saab allegedly used American banks to launder hundreds of millions of dollars stolen from a Venezuelan food program meant for the poor and proceeds from the illegal sale of Venezuelan oil," US Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva said in a statement.

Saab, who was expelled from Venezuela on Saturday, had originally become involved with politics in the South American country during the final years of leftist firebrand Hugo Chavez's 1999-2013 presidency.

Under Maduro, he was accused of acting as front man and money launderer, and in return was granted Venezuelan citizenship and a diplomatic passport.

First hit by US sanctions in 2019, Saab had been arrested in Cape Verde in 2020 and extradited to the United States the following year, but he was released in 2023 as part of a negotiated prisoner exchange with Venezuela.

Maduro appointed Saab to be his minister of industry in 2024, but shortly after US forces Maduro in a deadly Caracas raid earlier this year, interim president Delcy Rodriguez dismissed him from all his posts.