SANTO DOMINGO.- The ex Dominican Army captain Quirino Paulino remains attentive to the slightest movement of his assets seized in the country.

Paulino himself cautioned the Justice Ministry that the value of his seized prosperities it manages and would soon place on the block are worth more than RD$500 million.

This comes in the wake of demands by several nongovernment organizations which work to prevent drug use and with addicts, that they are entitled to a part of the assets, of around RD$78 million.

The drug trafficker seeks to be reimbursed any figure which exceeds the amount agreed upon with the U.S. authorities, during the Justice Ministry’s planned auction.

In a missive to Justice minister Radhamés Jiménez, Paulino’s lawyers Felix Damián Olivares and Freddy Castillo note that the agreement between the U.S. federal authorities, which the local authorities accepted, limited the voluntary seizure of assets to US$14.5 million. “We have subjective base to consider that the expropriated goods, in the absence of litigation, the determined limit well exceeds, and consequently is unacceptable from any point of view which, contrary to the agreement signed by us, and beyond our power of negotiation, the Justice Ministry seeks to extend the seizure in excess of what we accepted."

Olivares and Castillo requested a meeting with Jiménez, to delimit all regarding the handover of the assets corresponding to the agro company Hacienda Elizabeth, near Elias Piña, as well as the equipment of the rice mill at Comendador, and the silos at Punta Cana (all three localities in the country’s west).