WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- Colombian Fernain Rodriguez Vasquez was designated a significant foreign narcotics trafficker subject to sanctions, the U.S. Treasury Department said Wednesday.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control also designated seven other people and five entities that acted on behalf of Rodriguez Vasquez and provided support for his drug trafficking activities, the department said in a release.
"Drug trafficker Fernain Rodriguez Vazquez and his network have moved massive quantities of drugs for some of the most violent drug trafficking organizations in the Western Hemisphere, including the FARC [Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia], Los Zetas and the Sinaloa cartel," OFAC Director Adam Szubin said. "These sanctions will expose Rodriguez Vazquez's illicit network of agents and front companies and exclude them from the legitimate financial system."
Rodriguez Vasquez leads an international drug-trafficking and money-laundering organization in Colombia that exported nearly 100 tons of cocaine annually, the Treasury Department said.
Wednesday's action seizes property and interests in property in the United States or in the possession or control of Americans, and bars U.S. citizens for engaging in transactions with Rodriguez Vazquez, the seven other people or the five other entities.
Vasquez was designated under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act.
