Opposition leader Juan Guaido held talks with Venezuela’s public sector unions on Tuesday about staging strikes to help bring down the government, as President Nicolas Maduro said a “crazed minority” bent on destabilizing the country would be defeated.
After the strong support of the armed forces to the president, Nicolás Maduro, highlighted the figure of Vladimir Padrino López, the Defense Minister of that country, who responded to the president of the United States, Donald Trump, after his remarks on Monday about the danger that ran the military that was next to the Venezuelan leader.
Venezuelan authorities on Monday approved a new, privately run foreign exchange system that will operate in parallel to the official currency control system, as an emboldened opposition challenges President de facto Nicolás Maduro.
Uruguay and Bolivia will be the only South American countries attending this Thursday the inauguration of Venezuela's Nicolas Maduro for a second five year mandate. A regime which has become an increasingly international pariah for its non democratic practices, human rights abuses, and disastrous management of the economy creating a major humanitarian crisis with food and essential pharmaceutical shortages while some three million of Venezuelans have fled the country in desperation.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Monday the country’s civil militia had grown to 16 million members - more than tripling in size from the beginning of the year - and that its mission was to defend the country against external aggression.
Latin American leftwing governments which strongly oppose Washington's policies for the region gathered in Havanna at the XVI Summit of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples and the Treaty of Commerce of the Peoples (ALBA - TCP) to renew their regional commitment.
The Spanish Socialist leader, Pablo Iglesias, appeared before the Spanish Senate on Thursday over the alleged illegal financing that his political coalition, Podemos, could have received from Venezuela and Iran. In a tense debate with a senator from the Popular Party (PP), Iglesias said that the situation in the South American country “is disastrous” and that he regrets things he has said in the past.
President Nicolás Maduro consolidated his power even more by sweeping the elections to elect the municipal councils before an opposition that mostly decided to boycott the process since they consider that there are no conditions to guarantee a transparent election.
A court in the United States has sentenced the former head of Venezuela's treasury, Alejandro Andrade, to 10 years in prison for money laundering. Andrade, 54, had pleaded guilty to taking US$ 1bn in bribes in exchange for offering access to preferential foreign currency exchange rates.
President-elect Jair Bolsonaro said his government would not send back the tens of thousands of Venezuelans who have sought refuge in Brazil from the economic breakdown in their populist ruled homeland.