Prosecutor heads to Brazil as Maduro seeks her arrest

Bogota, Colombia — Venezuela’s former chief prosecutor — who says she has proof of corruption at the highest levels of the socialist administration — traveled to Brazil on Tuesday amid fevered speculation that she would ultimately seek asylum in the United States.

Luisa Ortega Diaz’s exact whereabouts have been shrouded in mystery since she fled Venezuela with her husband on Friday — taking a boat to Aruba and then a charter flight to Bogota.

On Monday, Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos offered her political asylum “if she wants it,” but by Tuesday afternoon government officials said she was on the move again — heading to Brazil where she is expected to deliver remarks at a meeting of international lawmakers.

Ortega, a longtime government insider who became chief prosecutor in 2007, is likely safeguarding some of the administration’s most damning legal secrets. And she’s thought to be working with U.S. law enforcement at a time when Washington is ratcheting up sanctions on Caracas.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Tuesday seemed to confirm that the U.S. was behind Ortega’s “great betrayal.”

“(She) wanted to hide behind the mask of being a leftist and a (socialist),” Maduro said. “But for some time, the ex-prosecutor has been working for the United States in hopes of damaging Venezuela.”