Bulletin Special
Bolivarian Government Ministry of People’s Embassy of the Bolivarian of Venezuela Power for Foreign Affairs Republic of Venezuela
volume 11, 2019
ATTEMPTED COUP IN VENEZUELA DEFEATED KEYS TO THE WITHDRAWAL OF VENEZUELA FROM THE OAS A DEEP EXPLANATION ON THE ECONOMIC BLOCK AGAINST VENEZUELA VENEZUELA BUILTS MORE THAN 2 MILLION 600 THOUSAND SOCIAL HOUSING MISSION
Venezuela denounces the US aggression to the world
Content 1) EDITORIAL 2) ATTEMPTED COUP IN VENEZUELA DEFEATED 3) A DEEP EXPLANATION ON THE ECONOMIC BLOCK AGAINST VENEZUELA 4) GOODBYE OAS: WHY VENEZUELA WITHDRAWS FROM OAS, WHAT NEXT? 5) EXPERTS ESTIMATE 40 THOUSAND VENEZUELANS HAVE DIED BECAUSE OF US SANCTIONS 6) VENEZUELA DENOUNCES CONSEQUENCES OF THE US BLOCKADE 7) VENEZUELA CALLS TO DEFEND MULTILATERALISM AND PEACE DIPLOMACY AT THE UN 8) VENEZUELA WILL DEMONSTRATE IN US COURTS ILLEGALITY OF THE THEFT OF CITGO 9) USA IMPOSES SANCTIONS AGAINST CHANCELLOR JORGE ARREAZA 10) KEYS TO THE WITHDRAWAL OF VENEZUELA FROM THE OAS 11) VENEZUELA BUILTS MORE THAN 2 MILLION 600 THOUSAND SOCIAL HOUSING MISSION
Editorial Before the attempted coup perpetrated by a group of irregulars who were stationed in the vicinity of Altamira in Caracas, to generate a military uprising, the Foreign Minister of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Jorge Arreaza, once again denounced the attempt of satellite governments supported by the United States to undermine Venezuelan democracy through unconstitutional strategies. A tiny group of National Guard officers accompanied by the self-proclaimed deputy Juan Guaidó and terrorist Leopoldo López, tried to disrupt the peace and tranquility of the Venezuelan people through a supposed coup d’état, a strategy that is part of the so-called “Freedom operation” and that is sponsored mainly by the government of the United States. The constitutional president, Nicolás Maduro Moros, at the same time, repudiated the open participation of Washington in this new aggression to the Peace of the Venezuelan People. “The Heads of the coup d’état acknowledge their authorship without scruples. The Trump Administration in its desperation aims to generate an internal conflict in Venezuela. The democratic institutions of Venezuela will guarantee the peace of the country”. Venezuela categorically rejects the imposition of illegal and unilateral coercive measures announced today by the government of the United States against the Venezuelan Foreign Minister and a judge of the republic, as part of the failed strategy by Washington, intended to intimidate, defame and persecute high officials of the Venezuelan State. This is a systematic plan that seeks to undermine the Republic institutions, Constitution and Legislation to promote a change of regime favorable to their interests. With such new measures, Trump’s Administration intends to silence Venezuela’s voice in the world and, at the same time, obstruct the independent, sovereign and legitimate administration of justice in the country.
ATTEMPTED COUP IN VENEZUELA DEFEATED
Highlights of the message of the Constitutional President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro Moros, broadcast on National radio and television network Miraflores palace, April 30th, 2019
We have come out with morality, with love and truth to the Venezuelan people as a shield in all conjunctures from now on, because our cause is crystal clear, for the defense of the Constitution, peace, and tranquility. At 4:15 am on Tuesday, April 30th, we were notified of a strange circumstance of an armed group that had been at the height of the Eastern Highway, next to La Carlota military base, Caracas. Some TV and radio news and social media reported that the air base was taken, but it never was, our FANB were loyal, guarding it. Between 5:30 am and 7:00 am, we met the faces of those present, they had 8 riot vehicles blocking the passage of the highway (that area has been taken 17 years by the Right to destabilize). It was seen a prisoner of justice, Mr. Leopoldo López (Voluntad Popular far-right wing party) who personally was directing the armed group that created the skirmish and then saw the self-proclaimed acting president of Venezuela Juan Guaidó, President of the National Assembly (Parliament) in contempt to the Venezuelan state of law, making a call to the people to support the coup d’état, never before seen in this stupid manner. But we are cured of horror. From the very morning, we were thinking about how to protect the people since the attempted coup civilian and small group of armed forces had 4 high-caliber machine guns. To shoot whom? To face whom? To the carrier army professionals of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB)? They were looking for a military confrontation and the resulting of people killed (the self-proclaimed Juan Guaidó has repeatedly said that "dead people are an investment for the future "). 3 3
Who benefits from this? Who rubs their hands? Deputies and factors of the extreme right wing from Voluntad Popular, who are also encouraging the skirmish through social networks. The Attorney General (FGR), Public Prosecutor’s Office, is interrogating those involved and is directing investigations and criminal accusations. As a result, for the time been, five (05) soldiers injured, two (02) colonels in intensive care and three (03) policemen. 80% of the military involved in the attempted coup were summoned under deception; the first ones that withdrew from the outside air base were from the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN) commandos, the other military involved gradually leaving the area were the professionals of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB). From 8 am to noon, the 8 tanks were taken back one by one to their places of origin and did not participate in the attempted coup d’état. I spoke with the soldiers, one by one, that gradually went out from the attempted coup and they ratified to me that they are “never traitors, always loyal”. Another attempted coup from Venezuelan opposite leaders left alone, being the only minimal group, with everyone already identified, who will face the destiny of traitors as those who have betrayed the Homeland before. Venezuela: Total alerts everyone! There are those abroad who wish an armed confrontation in Venezuela to justify military intervention in our country. It is necessary to spread the videos with testimonies of the soldiers deceived by the far right wing of Venezuela and foreign allies. These Venezuelan opposition leaders thought that with their call for a coup on Tuesday, April 30th, they would have a million people to come to Miraflores Palace, but they failed in their plan because the people of Venezuela want peace. Pronouncements and messages of world leaders, intellectuals and social movements are much appreciated. We recall to the few governments supporting the self-proclaimed acting president of Venezuela, Juan Guaidó, to open their eyes and we reject the “European democracy” which supports the coup d’état in Venezuela. When the Altamira high way Distributor was released, 200 “guarimberos” (armed protestors) remained, which must be identified and there must be presented into justice. After that, a group of twenty (20) or twenty-five (25) armed traitors army forces, already identified, headed to Altamira Square, located in Chacao Municipality, Miranta state (Caracas Metropolitan Area) and apparently they sought for refuge in an embassy, it would seem Brazilian, to be confirmed at this time of the night of Tuesday, April 30th. Thanks to the people of Venezuela because they heard my call: “nerves of steel, calm and sanity and for the street”. This Tuesday, April 30th already at 10 am there were 40, 50 and 60 thousand people surrounding the Miraflores Palace, the seat of the Bolivarian Government; people mobilized; the guarantee of peace and the existence of Venezuela is that of a mobilized people. There has not been a USA government t crazy as the present one. If you read the messages on Twitter, it shows how much hate these people have. How far does the lack of seriousness go? Of foolishness? Never has a US government ever acted against a people as they do against Venezuela now. That’s why I wanted to address to all of you tonight, President Nicolás Maduro said. Never before in the history of Venezuela had there been an uprising because of the obsessive effort, ominous of an opposition group of the Venezuelan ultra-right, the Colombian oligarchy, and US imperialism.
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We call everyone to the commemoration of Work Day on May 1st on the street and we called to continue transiting the path of work. To the FANB, we reiterate the call to stand together and unified with the Venezuelan people and keeping the slogan: “never traitors, always loyal”. It has been a hard day, this Tuesday, April 30th, but it’s a day when we have proved that we can do it, we can resist the imperialism and that Peace is our way. Congratulations to the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB), always loyal to the Venezuela people and to its Commander in Chief; greetings to the political leadership of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) Diosdado Cabello, President of the National Constituent Assembly; Aristóbulo Istúriz, Minister of People’s Power of Education; Erika Faría, Mayor of the Municipality Bolivarian Libertador of Caracas, Capital District; General in Chief Vladimir Padrino López, Minister of People’s Power of Defense; and to the new General Director of the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN), Major General Gustavo González López.
www.mppre.gob.ve
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Failed coup d'ĂŠtat is a fact manufactured by the US government After the new coup attempt on April 30th by the Venezuelan opposition, the ambassador of Venezuela to the United Nations (UN) Samuel Moncada, repudiated the acts of violence that are trying assault the legitimate and constitutional power of Venezuela. "The only oxygen tank that the Venezuelan ultra-right has to survive and act again is the support of the United States government," the diplomat said during statements at the UN headquarters in New York City. Moncada ruled that the failed coup is a fact manufactured by the Donald Trump government and that it failed because it has no popular roots. "There is not a single serious military man in Venezuela who considers this man (Leopoldo LĂłpez) as a leader," he said, referring to the leader of the Voluntad Popular party who is now a fugitive from justice. Ambassador Moncada also assured that although the puppets of the Venezuelan opposition are trying to open the doors for a new military intervention, the constitutional Government of the Republic continues to have absolute control of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces and of all the agencies of State security. "These puppet governments can not claim to be recognized for anything, they are only an instrument of looting the riches of Venezuela." During his statements, Moncada also pointed out that 25 of the soldiers who revolted and acted in treason against the Homeland have requested asylum in the Brazilian embassy. Finally, he assured that despite the forced attempts to reach the power and wealth of Venezuela, the people continue to support the Head of State and Government, NicolĂĄs Maduro, as their sole and constitutional leader. www.mppre.gob.ve
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A DEEP EXPLANATION ON THE ECONOMIC BLOCK AGAINST VENEZUELA
The Trump Administration has acted with a consistent aggressiveness in the policy of sanctions and blockade applied systematically against Venezuela. They have reached a zenith during the year 2019, since the advent - by order of the White House - of the parallel presidency of Juan Guaidó and the structuring of a full spectrum siege route against the new presidential term of Nicolás Maduro.
The induced devaluation of its currency through the positioning and manipulation of a parallel exchange rate, the imposition of bookmarks and websites based in the USA, which have produced speculative stampedes and a constant depreciation of the local currency. It has induced a very significant mess in the systems and subsystems of supply and prices in the Venezuelan economy, affecting the availability of mass consumption goods and other goods sensitive to the consumption of the population.
In these instances, the sanctions and measures of economic pressure should not be understood as a situation isolated from the set of diplomatic, political, communications and military pressures that Washington has orchestrated against Caracas in recent years.
In this process, monopolistic and oligopolistic chains of the Venezuelan private sector have participated, whose owners are openly anti-Chavez, and who manage the production and distribution of these goods, deregulating the population's access to these products and creating a fall in the inventories of the shelves. , circumventing state regulations and on the contrary favoring the sale of products at speculative prices in informal sectors not subject to state regulations. This last practice is known in Venezuelan jargon as "bachaqueo".
It is also essential to assume that the resurgence of economic asphyxia actions, start in 2019 from a depletion and wear of domestic economic boycott actions that the country has suffered in recent years, without producing the expected result: President Nicolás Maduro's departure from political power. Understand with it, that Venezuela has suffered in recent years a set of turbulent economic situations. Namely: 7
Accelerate the deterioration of the Venezuelan economic fabric, sharpening the contradictions created during the economic war, to impoverish the living conditions of the population in general and strengthen the social base in support of anti-Chavezism and Washington's acts of interference in the country.
The smuggling of food and medicines to neighboring countries, especially Colombia, boosted by induced foreign exchange spreads, has been another aggravating factor that exacerbated shortages and irregularities in distribution processes. The contraband variable favored in these years the shortage of products made in Venezuela and consequently the inflation of the prices of these goods.
To aggravate the deterioration of the elementary conditions of life, as an indispensable component of the narrative of "humanitarian crisis", with which the White House has manufactured consensus in the US and the international community to legitimize its destitute actions in the oil nation.
Speculation has been an element that has strongly boosted hyperinflation, disarticulating in fact all the measures of protection and regulation of the State, creating then disordered economic conditions and highly damaging the pockets of the salaried class of the country.
Washington has recognized that the mere economic suffocation of the population has not been enough to generate the resignation of President Maduro. On the contrary, there has been a self-fulfilling liberal prophecy that affirms that sanctions entrench the power of a target country over itself. For this, the US government has accelerated the coercive measures directly on civil and military officials of Venezuela, with the purpose of breaking the national institutionality and corralling the government officials. However, these actions have not proven effective so far.
Speculation was incorporated into the economic fabric through its most salient practices: speculation about the value of the local currency against the dollar (by hand parallel markers) and on the other hand, speculation about the value of goods and services in all lines and expressions of the national economy, in a trend that was undertaken from the large private enterprise and thus cascaded to all sectors that are part of the network of medium and small private companies.
The sanctions against the entire economy and against Chavismo officials, in unison of pressure, calls for a coup d'etat to the Venezuelan military and amnesties promised to insurgents, seek to break the political and institutional military fabric, thereby generating a general commotion in the structure of the State, a collapse that makes the Venezuelan power a vulnerable structure susceptible to assault. Washington has called the Venezuelan military to do a "job to order" on Venezuelan soil in favor of the Trump Administration, without the result so far is expected.
This cycle was developed with great emphasis from 2014 until 2018 and still persists. The "perfect storm" of the Venezuelan economy was joined by exogenous phenomena, such as the pronounced cycle of low oil prices from 2014 to 2018 that affected the Venezuelan economy from its fundamental vulnerability; The State, through its oil exports and other strategic goods, is the one that enters more than 90% of the foreign currency into the Venezuelan economy, an economy in addition, supported by imports of goods, equipment and supplies for the production of food and medicine.Gregorio Terán / AVN
Washington has seriously considered the military route to displace Chavez. In that plot, the economic blockade has been an element of enormous exasperation in the Venezuelan population and creates a base of support for these actions inside and outside the country. The blockade has accelerated migration from Venezuela, the propaganda of the "humanitarian crisis" and the declaration of a "failed state". In the eventuality of a military onslaught, through regular or mercenary means, sanctions will be an important addition to accelerate the collapse of the country and its population. An emblematic precedent on this item is the case of Iraq, a country where more people died due to the economic blockade prior to 2003 than due to the invasion during that year.
The displacement of President Maduro and the chavism of power, depends on several alleged spinal causes through sanctions and acts of blockade: 8
Venezuela then acquires a quality of political showcase and element of modulation of the policy of the Department of State, in the face of domestic US policy and facing the emerging world (Russia and China), the latter given the amount of strategic resources of the country that the US intends to co-opt as it did in the historical cycle of the 20th century.
RADIOGRAPHY TO PUNITIVE SANCTIONS APPLIED AGAINST VENEZUELA The anatomy of the acts of blockade and sanctions against the Venezuelan economy, is characterized by the political determination of the Trump Administration to place Venezuela in a privileged place of US policy. In 2018, Washington firmly assumes with its own hand the suffocation of the country and during 2019 the trend has escalated to unprecedented levels. US power has placed the country as a benchmark for its foreign policy for the Western Hemisphere.
BLOCKING AND FINANCIAL BOYCOTT ACTIONS The affectations to the regularity of the financial relationship of Venezuela are the starting point to disable its liquidity and on the other hand, to affect the flow of merchandise, with great emphasis on the State purchases of food and medicines. In effect, recently the Venezuelan State gave body to a humanitarian assistance plan with the International Red Cross, to bring medicines and avoid the obstacles and financial surcharges that have hindered the acquisition of medicines for the benefit of the population. Venezuela has also worked with Russia and China in that direction to avoid situations, such as the blockade in Spain by the airline Iberia and the authorities of that country to a shipment of medicines destined for Venezuela.
NBC News The great emphasis of the White House has been on deepening the destitution mechanisms in Venezuela, as soon as possible, given that the Venezuelan issue and that of the "troika of evil" and socialism in the continent (Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua), they are a factor in the pre-campaign for the US presidential elections of 2020.
Reference Since August 2017, Trump vetoed the country from bond markets on US soil through direct actions against the Sovereign Bonds issued by the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV) and the state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA). The objective of this action was to disable the country in its financing and debt refinancing capacities accumulated so far. They also aimed to affect the capabilities of PDVSA to obtain financing for the maintenance and expansion of its oil fields through the petrobonos emission mechanism.
In his speech to the nation earlier this year and thus in front of the Latino community at the University of Florida, Trump centralized his narrative in preventing his country from traveling along the path of socialism. Centralizing a campaign around a binary ideological discussion is unusual in the US and this is explained by the rise of the left wing in the Democratic Party and the outstanding pre-candidacies of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, Trump's clear political antagonists.
Through an executive order at the end of August 2017, CITGO Petroleum Corporation, a PDVSA subsidiary in the US, was also ordered not to send dividends for its activities to its parent company. At the same time, the Treasury Department initiated the application of discretionary measures against Venezuelan funds and accounts abroad.
This situation and other contradictions generated in the struggle between elites in the US, define the anatomy and aggressiveness of these actions, to present the expected fall of Maduro as an exemplary factor of "struggle against socialism" and the "effectiveness" of foreign policy Trump, which has proven to be on several fronts, erratic, inconsistent and ineffective.
In 2018 and 2019 the strategy has been very aggressive. In January 2018, eleven Venezuelan and PDVSA bonds, valued at 1 thousand 241 million dollars, could not be paid to their creditors due to the obstacle of sanctions 9
through the disqualification of bank accounts in Citibank. In March 2018, the Trump Administration, through an executive order, declared illegal the purchase or other operation related to the cryptocurrency designed by the Venezuelan State, the Petro or any other Venezuelan cryptocurrency by American companies and citizens. By mid-2018, the accounts of the BCV and Banco de Venezuela (state-owned), on US soil, were disqualified. In March 2018, they froze some 2.5 billion dollars from Venezuela that were withheld in US banks. This money was largely going to be directed to the payment of international creditors, pushing the default and the consequent opening of legal proceedings by the creditors against the country. On January 28, 2019, the US Treasury Secretary and his office that regulates foreign assets in that country (OFAC, for its acronym in English) added new actions against PDVSA that were made by freezing some 7 billion dollars in assets of the Venezuelan state oil company, including CITGO, with the addition of a loss estimated by the department itself of 11 billion dollars of Venezuelan oil exports to the US during the next few years.
In that same interview, Maduro said that Portugal has also frozen "more than 2,000 million dollars" destined to buy those same medicines. Venezuela has reportedly denounced the closure of accounts and the boycott of financial institutions for their commercial operations. "International purchases with suppliers are agreed, the use of a specific bank is agreed to make payments and later the banks refuse to carry out operations for fear of reprisals," denounced the Venezuelan ambassador to the United Nations (UN) Samuel Moncada . In fact, the envoy for Venezuela, Elliott Abrams, recently confirmed to the press in his country that the State Department and other US government agencies were monitoring the commercial and financial activities of Venezuela, including shipping companies and banks that had relationship with the country, to indicate that "they should not do that".
In January, the retention of 1,300 million euros in collateral in gold was also reported by the Bank of England. It is about 14 tons of gold that the State tried to repatriate without success and that would pass to the control of the "legitimate authorities of Venezuela", that is, the parallel government of Juan Guaidó, which would access these funds through discretionary actions and arbitration by the United States. On March 22, 2019, OFAC decided to take action against the Bank of Economic and Social Development of Venezuela (BANDES), including its subsidiaries in Uruguay and Bolivia. The Banco de Venezuela and Banco Bicentenario, all state banks, were also sanctioned to disable their ability to maneuver and their use for the financial intermediation of the country. The OFAC ordered the closure of all operations of any banking entity related to or with operations in the US, with those Venezuelan banks. In an interview for the BBC, President Nicolás Maduro denounced that the Euroclear asset settlement system has "kidnapped" 1,400 million dollars of Venezuelan money, destined to "bring medicines against diabetes, against cancer". When asked by BBC World, Euroclear simply replied that its "policy is to comply in full with the applicable laws and regulations" and that "consistently takes the necessary actions in this regard."
Timothy Clary / AFP On April 17 of this year, actions against the BCV were announced. "I am pleased to announce new sanctions against the Central Bank of Venezuela, aimed at limiting US transactions with this bank and closing access to US dollars," said National Security Advisor John Bolton, during a press conference in Miami. In his statements Bolton explained that these unilateral measures against the BCV represent a "firm warning to all external actors, including Russia, not to deploy military resources in Venezuela." Also, the OFAC indicated that the Treasury Department acted against the BCV "to prevent it from being used as a tool of the illegitimate regime of Maduro," in the words of Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin, in a statement.
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ACTIONS AGAINST THE VENEZUELAN PETROLEUM INDUSTRY The blocking actions against the Venezuelan economy, include exact damages against the oil industry, main source of income of foreign currency to Venezuela. The Venezuelan energy activity is under the ownership of the Venezuelan State and its foreign partners through majority conditions of state ownership over deposits, operations and exports.
crude and it points to the countries of the emerging bloc. But this happens with enormous setbacks.
The blockade of the oil industry is extensive to diminish the capacity of the Venezuelan government in carrying out debt compliance, executing investment plans in strategic economic areas other than oil, sustaining public services and importing goods from machinery, equipment, inputs for production. of food and medicine in the country.
The Indian conglomerate Reliance Industries, PDVSA's main customer in that country, contacted the AFP agency and said: "Our subsidiary in the United States has completely stopped all business with the Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA, and its global parent company has not increased purchases. "On April 12, OFAC sanctions oil tankers that sent Venezuelan crude to Cuba. However, the measure is considered a test modality to pressure shipping companies and suppliers of crude transport services to stop their services that still lend to the country.
At the end of January of this year John Bolton announced the freezing of Venezuelan assets on US soil. These assets belong to CITGO, which has three refineries in the United States, a network of pipelines and more than 5,000 gas stations on the east coast. The US assumed a position of arbitration and discretion over Venezuelan assets, preventing the legitimate government of Venezuela from having access to revenues from CITGO activities, blocking all PDVSA properties and interests subject to its US jurisdiction and prohibiting US citizens participate in transactions with them. US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said at that time that CITGO could continue its operations if its revenues were deposited in a blocked account in the US, which would be enabled for use and control of the parallel government of Juan Guaidó. At the same time, a process of substitution of the CITGO directive and the appointment of new managers by the artificial and parallel government began. The Venezuelan president accused the United States of "transiting the illegal path of stealing the CITGO company from Venezuela" and said that he will defend the country's wealth through the courts. In unison with these actions, the US determines the veto of Venezuelan crude oil in the US unless the payments for crude sales were made to accounts for the benefit of the air government of Guaidó, an issue that Chavez would not accept. This became the exit of Venezuela from the extra heavy crude market in the US, a country with more than 50% of the refining capacity of this crude, whose main producers are Saudi Arabia, Canada and Venezuela. Although the exit of Venezuelan crude from the US market has hurt the circuit of heavy and extra heavy refiners in that country, the blocking plot against has generated the search for new markets for Venezuelan 11
According to various media, exact pressures from the US government against India inhibited the extension of the existing agreements between Venezuela and India, an issue that closed the probability raised in mid-February of doubled shipments to the Asian nation. The most recent visit of Mike Pompeo to India fulfilled that task.
Beyond the effects on oil exports, there are other serious damages to the Venezuelan oil industry. Venezuela through its state-owned PDVSA used to import about 100 thousand barrels per day of naphtha from the United States, an indispensable diluent to process, transport and dispatch extra-heavy crude, the main export crude. But the actions of the White House have ruined this, which has affected its production levels, losing 300 thousand barrels of production per day due to this factor alone. A damage of great proportionality to Venezuelan income, because of the boycott that the United States is carrying out not only on US soil, but in other countries simultaneously. The company India Reliance Industries, in its commercial turn with Venezuela due to US pressures, revealed that "since the sanctions were imposed and against what some reports say, Reliance has stopped all supplies of diluents to PDVSA and will not resume those sales until that sanctions are lifted. " This was referred to by the BBC, in the name of Reliance, owned by Mukash Ambani, the richest man in Asia and who has close ties to the US economy. On January 29, Venezuela received the last naphtha dispatch from Reliance in the port of Jose, in eastern Venezuela, according to Refinitiv Eikon, an energy company specializing in crude refining. In recent days the Venezuelan joint venture Petro San Felix, also in the east, suffered a sensitive attack on its facilities with the explosion caused by two tanks with diluents, an event that was cataloged by the president of PDVSA, Manuel Quevedo, as an "act terrorist "that would be framed in the road map to destabilize the country.
Given the induced drop in naphtha inventories, PDVSA has had to start mixing light crude, with its extra-heavy crude, in order to be able to carry out shipments and avoid a drastic fall in exports. Light crude oil is increasingly scarce and is the fundamental input of the diet of Venezuelan refineries, which supply the domestic fuel market.
In various media publications have been made about the withdrawal of these companies from Venezuela and although in both cases the parent companies of these companies have denied this, it is not entirely clear if these corporations under the Western orbit have been subject to pressure and US lobbying to cease operations with the Venezuelan state.
The latter assumes that the US expects to hit the normal flow of gasoline in Venezuela, through a "scissors operation" to the vital processes of PDVSA and further deconfigure the country. This element could be connected to the statements recently made by US Senator Marco Rubio, who prophetically stated that "the Venezuelan population would suffer a severe shortage of food and gasoline."
BLOCKING MINING ACTIVITY The actions of Washington being known against financial and oil activities, the Venezuelan government decided to carry out a plan of investments, exploitations and exports of the mineral wealth of the country, through the territorial fringe of the Orinoco Mining Arc, with the purpose of diversifying exports Venezuelans to favor the dwindling entry of foreign currency into the country and attract foreign investment.
In addition to the acts already described, the blockade of PDVSA operations applies to the de facto embargo that exists on spare parts, equipment and spare parts for oil installations, whose technology depends to a large extent on the US industrial oil circuit. Refineries, tank yards, fuel filling plants, oil wells, pipelines and a set of operations related to oil extraction in Venezuela and processing of derivatives, have an inertia of more than 100 years of American technologies that Chavez has not achieved replace totality through its alliances with China and Russia.
For the country, gold exports are strategic. In November 2018 the Minister of People's Power for Ecological Mining Development at that time, Víctor Cano, reported that Venezuela has certified approximately 2,300 tons of gold and the country aims to achieve a privileged place in the world. "There is inferred data of the amount of gold that exists in the Orinoco Mining Arc and we can reach 8,300 tons, this would place us as the second country with the largest gold reserves in the world," the official said.
The oil technology park continues to be highly dependent on the circuit of US suppliers, located mainly in Texas, Oklahoma and Alabama, which have closed their supplies to Venezuela without offering further explanations.
However, the investment prospects of some companies suffered a setback when, in November 2018, the White House ordered a new executive order where they expressly promise actions against any person or company on US soil or related to that country, if it operates in the sector of exploitation of Venezuelan gold.
This has contributed to weaken PDVSA's procurement of many indispensable equipment to sustain its production levels and regularly support other related activities of the oil industry in the country, especially the flow of fuel for the domestic market.
These sanctions have been prepared to break the commercial and financial structure of the sale of gold, which take place through transactions in dollars, with accounts in the US or banks linked to the US financial network. On March 19, 2019, the Treasury Department undertook a new retaliation to Venezuela and its gold exports claiming to pursue the "illicit operations in gold" of the Venezuelan State, and devotes good paragraphs to disqualify the Orinoco Mining Arc under presumed defenses of the environment and the rights of the indigenous peoples of the Bolívar state and Venezuelan Guayana. Washington set out to sanction the state company Minerven, the executing agency and main asset in the strategic minerals industry in Venezuela.
PDVSA On the other hand, multidirectional pressures have also been known against PDVSA's partners in the petroleum developments in Venezuela, Total de Francia and Repsol in Spain, who are forced to reduce their involvement with the country. 12
Article by: Franco Vielma www.misionverdad.com The opinions expressed in these articles are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Embassy
GOODBYE OAS: WHY VENEZUELA WITHDRAWS FROM OAS, WHAT NEXT? The withdrawal of Venezuela from the Organization of American States (OAS) is an unprecedented fact. Cuba is the only nation on the continent that is not part of that organization because of its expulsion in 1962, as a punishment for the revolution led by Fidel Castro. There is no registered case of the activation of the voluntary separation instruments of a country of said instance. Venezuela, on April 26, 2017, began the process of withdrawal of said entity by direct instruction of President Nicolás Maduro. In this way, article 143 of the Charter of the Organization of American States of 1948 was invoked. This instrument provides for denunciation by letter to the Secretary General and other member countries,
noting that, "after two years from the date on which the General Secretariat receives notification of denunciation, this Charter (the founding charter of the OAS) it will cease to be effective in relation to the denouncing State, and the latter will be separated from the Organization after having complied with the obligations arising from this Charter ". The Venezuelan State has been responsible for the fulfillment of this period and the payment of its obligations before this instance. Fulfilling these requirements, Venezuela marks the fate of an organization that is dismantled, as a result of clearly interfering spurious acts resulting from an alignment of right-wing governments in the region, supervised by the OAS, through the direct action of the Trump Administration. In this sense, Luis Almagro's actions are key. 13
The diligent antipolitics exercised by the Secretary General will be a reference for the record of the absolute decline in which that organization submerges itself in an unquestionable manner. In the last two years the political process of separation has been clearly induced, as have been the acts of interference, which at this moment reaches a critical moment accompanying the formulation of a para-state and the construction of a parallel institutionality within and especially outside of Venezuela, through the sponsorship of the White House.
of interference or tendency to attack the personality of the State, the political, economic and cultural elements that constitute it ". However, the US government and other countries of the so-called Group of Lima, within the OAS and outside it, have been emblematic of the systematic violation of that document, attacking the spirit of Venezuela's political model, denying its institutions and legitimate rights exercised through voting by the Venezuelan population.
LOBBYING AND INJURY It is essential to first indicate the political situation of Venezuela in said entity in the last two years. To begin with, the denominator that has governed the functioning of the OAS has been the lobbying of US foreign policy on the organization at the expense of a major political upsurge of right-wing governments in the region. The internal bid in the organization had relevant events. One of them was the approval in June 2018 of a resolution that sought to generate the conditions for the suspension of Venezuela from the agency. That resolution qualified as outside the "international standards" the elections of May 20 of that year, in which President Nicolás Maduro was re-elected with 68% of the total votes. By means of a roll-call vote, with 19 votes in favor, 11 abstentions and 4 votes against, this resolution was approved. However, the US, promoter of the initiative, did not achieve the automatic suspension of Venezuela. But the essential argument to refute the elections of May 20, would be the central narrative thread that would establish a new full spectrum siege route against Venezuela, having its climax point in the regional scene, precisely from the OAS and from that resolution . The impossibility of grouping two-thirds of the votes of the members of the Permanent Council over several sessions led the US and its satellites to reconfigure their strategy on the external front to Venezuela, starting the Lima Group as an instance, if non-binding or formal, rather belligerent to position the Venezuelan issue as a special focus of siege, intimidation, pressure and legitimization of the economic blockade against the country. Article 19 of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, text that keeps the spirit of the entity, expressly states: "No State or group of States has the right to intervene, directly or indirectly, and for whatever reason, in internal or external matters of The previous principle excludes not only armed force, but also any other form
THE CONDITION OF MEMBER AS A PRESSURE MECHANISM During the last two years the narrative has been built that Venezuela withdraws from the entity to act as "outlaw state" at its ease, without having to submit to the obligations imposed on the organization. This narrative has served to strengthen the criminalization of the country. In fact, specific pressures were established against Venezuela to deny the political obstructionism in which the country would remain and the negative consequences on the Venezuelan economy, which would have the withdrawal of the entity and its departure from the permits, treaties, agreements and commercial protocols of the "system Inter-American In this way, and through the accompaniment of the diplomatic and ecomomic asphyxiating agenda of the US, the OAS wore all the dissuasive elements to make Venezuela withdraw its decision to withdraw from the entity. Which means that for the inter-American bureaucracy, the imminence of the withdrawal meant a factor of alarm. Simultaneously, President Maduro strengthened his position in the government, ended his first presidential term and the disturbances induced from abroad did not manage to change the government of Caracas. 14
THE PROTO-STATE ABROAD Since the beginning of 2019 Washington decided to accelerate multifactorial pressures against Venezuela, creating an "interim presidency", but without real dimensions, as operative device of a para-state that rests on the figure of deputy Juan Guaidó. As is well known, the position of Guaidó is irrelevant for the purposes of Venezuela's internal policy. But on him it is tried to legitimize before the public opinion the looting in course against Venezuela. Namely: kidnapping of Venezuelan assets in the US, arbitration of Venezuelan resources (both physical and financial) and the creation of a portable diplomacy, named, in theory, by Juan Guaidó, through a compromise with anti-Chavez parties in Venezuela. The Trump Administration places these facts as advances of the strategy, selling as "successful" its sponsorship to the artificial government of Guaidó, thus developing the model of siege and external relations of the Trump administration as a more elaborate form of parallel government models in the exile created for Libya and Syria respectively, which had the Hillary Clinton patent and the "Arab spring". April 9, the OAS approved a controversial resolution within the organization in which Gustavo Tarre Briceño was formally recognized as the only de facto representative of Venezuela. The event was careful to try to preserve the formality. In theory, it was not Guaidó as President of the Republic, but Guaidó as President of the parliament, who made effective the appointment of the "ambassador". Did the resolution in question mark a milestone in the history of the regional diplomatic body, which had never before recognized the diplomatic representative appointed by a "head of state" out of office? The contradiction is exposed by itself. The resolution of the Permanent Council of the OAS (CP / RES. 1124) uses as a legal basis the provisions of Article 80 of the OAS Charter, which establishes that each government of the member states of the organization has the authority to accredit your acting representative. Article 80 of the OAS Charter expressly states that "The Permanent Council of the Organization is composed of one representative from each member state, appointed by the respective Government with the ambassador category, and each government may accredit an interim representative, as well as the substitute representatives and advisors that it deems appropriate ".
Although the debate in the OAS was based on decreeing that the National Assembly in contempt and out of office in Venezuela is the "only legitimate instance" of the country and that it was therefore essential to accept Tarre Briceño, for the purpose of applying Article 80 the Permanent Council awarded to Guaidó presidential powers that it does not have. The resolution also violated the Venezuelan Constitution that allows only the President of the Republic to appoint the representative to the OAS. Likewise, they mentioned Article 3 of the Statute of the Permanent Council of the OAS as the legal basis for resolution CP / RES 1124, that article in question indicates that, when appointing a new interim representative, the government of each country communicate to the secretary general of the organization. The text reads: "The Government of each Member State shall inform the Secretary General of the appointment of its representative, as well as the appointment of alternate representatives and advisers and, when appropriate, of the interim representatives. He shall inform the Permanent Council each time a Member State accredits a new permanent representative to the Organization. " THE POLITICAL DRIFT FROM NOW The artificial government of Guaidó, will be ready to take the diplomatic headquarters of Venezuela in Washington, once the Venezuelan delegation makes its withdrawal as planned. At this time, it is known that activists against the intervention of Venezuela have taken those spaces into shelter. This fact suggests that the US government will surely take action in this matter by placing itself in the paternal position of granting a seat to its parallel government in Venezuela, which will eventually be made a diplomatic seat. Just weeks after the expiration of the deadline for the departure of Venezuela from the OAS, the member countries of the Permanent Council of the OAS on instructions from the White House, have decided to expedite a process to sustain, also parallel and artificially, the presence of Venezuela in that organization. The OAS has already held sessions and 10 countries criticized the presence of Tarre Briceño on the table, with the positions remaining clear as on previous occasions. There is no news about the correlation of political forces in that forum. At the OAS, discussions will continue to focus on Venezuela, now with a voice that, in the name of the country, will sponsor new resolutions that are adverse to the national interest. These events will coincide with the fait accompli of the presence of an "Ambassador" without government in Caracas and with the country in fact, 15outside of the organization.
The exit already consummated of Venezuela and of its legitimate government of the OAS and of the inter-American system, will be indispensable input of the argument of the "outlaw country". This implies that Washington will continue to build consensus on its internal and external policies to continue developing its destitute road map in Venezuela. The institutional exhaustion of the entity will be appreciated in the short term by strengthening the diatribe and breaking the elementary formalities of internal governance. On this item it is essential to weigh the management of Luis Almagro, now subject to review and at the doors of a forthcoming election of the Secretary General, on a fragile structure marked by broad disagreements. The recent spasms in the OAS are symptomatic that the US agenda for the continent is very aggressive. And this must be seen broadly. In fact, the dismantling of UNASUR, the creation of PROSUR, the consolidation of the Pacific Alliance and the stagnation of CELAC, are exemplary elements of the process of remodeling the system of international relations that had been built in recent years.
Washington is also demonstrating that even in the frame of the turbulent Trump administration, its tactical approach is being successful and is leveraged by the current cycle of right-wing uptick in the region. We must not divest that item of the direct siege to "the troika", Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, the main countries of ALBA-TCP, critical points in this point of disfigurement of regional political relations and that the Venezuelan government has denounced as the resurgence of the Monroe Doctrine in charge of the neoconservatives in power in the USA. What happens is a process of reversion of the formal geopolitical counterweight structures that had set in the Latin American progressive cycle. These contradictions have generated that the process of counterweight has been outsourced to an extra regional factor. China is the only factor of proportion that is fighting the US influences in the region, once a great attrition was generated in the faculties of dispute that Venezuela reached on a medium scale in previous years. The moment imposes new movements and these fall with special emphasis now on Venezuela and the ALBA countries as the only counterhegemonic fortification on the continent.
www.misionverdad.com The opinions expressed in these articles are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Embassy
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EXPERTS ESTIMATE 40 THOUSAND VENEZUELANS HAVE DIED BECAUSE OF US SANCTIONS As noted on the CEPR website, Mark Weisbrot and Dean Baker are the founding scholars of the Center for Economic Research and Policy in 1999. They note that the firm has developed a reputation for timely, high-quality, original and independent research. . In particular Sachs, is one of the most influential economists in the world. The Guardian form of the United Kingdom has defined the CEPR as "one of the most valuable resources we have to explain how the economy works and how policies affect the lives of all of us". On the other hand, the firm Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR for its acronym in English), identified CEPR as "the most profitable think tank in the country, measured by media quotes and web traffic, per dollar." FAIR has pointed out that "for years, the Center for Economic and Political Research has been at the forefront of anticipating and understanding the dominant economic trends in the United States and the global economy, and of translating these trends into their political and social implications." The document that illustrates some of the impacts of the encirclement and suffocation operations against Venezuela was made by economists Mark Weisbrot and Jeffrey Sachs.
A report was released by the independent firm called Center for Political and Economic Research (CEPR), based in the USA, where they established the impact of sanctions on the Venezuelan population and measures of economic suffocation that the US government applies to Venezuela.
DAMAGE TO PDVSA AND VENEZUELA EXPORTS The CEPR indicates that the sanctions have contributed to a sharp decrease in oil production in Venezuela, the main source of foreign exchange earnings to the Venezuelan economy by more than 90%, which caused great damage to the population.
The fundamental approach of the document is clear: US sanctions against Venezuela applied since August 2017, are causing the "death of tens of thousands of people and are worsening the humanitarian crisis" in the oil country, which as is known, It has been declared a political and military objective of the US government.
The document outlines that sanctions applied since August 2017 included a ban on doing business with the new debt issues of Caracas or shares of the state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA). Those measures also applied the veto to the Sovereign Bonds issued by the Central Bank of Venezuela (BCV).
AUTHORITY OF THE DOCUMENT The report entitled "Economic Sanctions as Collective Punishment: The Case of Venezuela" was prepared by this research center, which is an independent firm of analysts and academics from several countries, but mainly from the United States.
On the other hand, Venezuela is now dealing with a boycott of its exports. The country has been relegated 17
from the US oil market, pressures are being placed on its other customers and the supply of diluents has also been banned, specifically naphtha, an indispensable input for the shipment and dispatch of the extra-heavy crudes exported by Venezuela.
DAMAGES AGAINST THE POPULATION Weisbrot and Sachs estimate that the measures applied by the administration of Donald Trump caused the death of around 40,000 people in Venezuela, between 2017 and 2018. "The sanctions have reduced the availability of food and medicines, and have increased diseases and mortality ", says the document textually.
Recently, through specific pressures from Washington, Reliance International of India, the last provider of diluents to PDVSA, canceled supplies to Venezuela.
In addition, they project that the continuity of the blockade on Venezuela will generate more deaths. They make an estimation of the impact on groups with a vulnerable state of health that are suffering from the blocking of medicines. "Approximately 80,000 people with HIV who have not received antiretroviral treatment since 2017, another 16,000 people who need dialysis, some 16,000 people with cancer and 4 million people with diabetes and hypertension (many of whom can not get insulin or cardiovascular medicine."
It is also known that the Venezuelan oil industry has suffered an embargo of spare parts, supplies and spare parts to its oil extraction and refining technologies, highly dependent on US suppliers, which have applied a de facto embargo that has seriously affected oil production and the exports. THE "EFFECT GUAIDÓ" AND THE UPSURGE OF THE PENALTIES The CEPR document states that "the recognition by the Trump administration of a parallel government in January created a new set of financial and commercial sanctions that are devastating for the economy and the population." According to analysts, "these new restrictions make it much more difficult to even pay for medicines and other essential imports with the limited available currencies."
The Venezuelan authorities have consistently denounced that the entry of medicines and medical supplies into the country has been torpedoed by concrete actions of blockade to Venezuelan accounts and the modalities of purchase of the country in the international market because of the sanctions. The banks refuse to carry out operations with Venezuela, as well as the pharmaceutical companies.
The reference is specific to the freezing of accounts, cash assets and Venezuelan assets on US soil, including CITGO Petroleum Corporation, a subsidiary of PDVSA in the US. Situation that has accelerated the loss of income to the nation and the discretionary position through arbitration of the US Treasury Department on the sovereign assets of Venezuela, thereby giving shape to a Venezuelan proto-state abroad represented in the artificial government of Juan Guaidó , to the detriment of national resources to meet the needs of the population.
Although the Venezuelan government has recently secured a humanitarian assistance agreement with the International Red Cross, in order to avoid the financial blockade, not all guarantees are given. The aggressiveness of the US blockade actions are generating pressures from and towards various directions, even for multilateral instances. An antecedent of this was the agreement that the government of Venezuela tried to apply with the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and that has practically been without effect, after the palpable American pressures in the inter-American system. The CEPR foresees that a worsening of the effects of the sanctions will further compromise the situation of the Venezuelan population.
PRESSURES AGAINST THE ECONOMIC RECOVERY OF VENEZUELA The authors of the aforementioned investigation also explain how sanctions "prevent an economic recovery in Venezuela." Jeffrey Sachs, co-author of the document states that "US sanctions are deliberately aimed at destroying Venezuela's economy and, therefore, leading to regime change: it is an unsuccessful, ruthless, illegal and failed policy that causes serious damage to the Venezuelan people. "
www.misionverdad.com The opinions expressed in these articles are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official position of the Embassy
The authors detail the fall of exports and imports from Venezuela and refer to a condition of prolonged instability, induced and accelerated by economic blockade operations in the middle of a destitute plot of the Venezuelan government. 18
Venezuela denounces consequences of the US blockade The Chancellor of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Jorge Arreaza, denounced on Thursday the consequences of the United States' criminal blockade against the country. "Venezuela is not a threat to any neighboring country and less to the United States. The sanctions are not against officials, it is against the people, against our economy, "Foreign Minister Arreaza told the international press at the headquarters of the United Nations (UN). He stressed that they have declared a campaign to make the world aware of the consequences of the unilateral blockade of the US Government. on Venezuela, which has generated consequences that "has claimed the lives of thousands of Venezuelans." The diplomat said that at this moment a struggle has been deepened to achieve control of the nation's wealth, particularly, "against the social model of the Bolivarian Revolution developed by Commander Hugo Chávez with the Venezuelan people." He explained that the country has been affected "in a substantial way, closing the bank accounts, keeping the money". In addition, he denounced that there are 5,000 million euros from Venezuela blocked in different European banks, thus fulfilling the US measures. to harm our country. "There is an offensive against Venezuela, it attacks the Central Bank of Venezuela so that we can not comply with the importation of products for the welfare of the people," he said. Source: VTV April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
Venezuela announces that it will expand its military alliance with Russia for the defense of peace Venezuela announced that it will expand military cooperation with Russia for "defense and peace," Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza said Thursday at a press conference held at the United Nations. "Are we not going to protect ourselves?" Argued the foreign minister to defend the alliance on military matters with Russia, in the face of threats of US intervention. against the Bolivarian country. Foreign Minister Arreaza points out that the military alliance with Russia does not represent a "threat" to the United States government. "We will continue working in the industrial, mining, scientific and military areas to guarantee the peace and security of Venezuela. Similarly, he noted that Venezuela does not seek to seal alliances with Moscow for the war: "In the military area we will always increase military cooperation with Russia for peace." Minister Arreaza said that with Russia there is already an exchange in military science and the use of defense equipment. "We do not want war, we seek alliances for defense and peace," he stressed. "Our weapons are not massive destruction, like those used by the United States government, our weapons are the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and the Charter of the United Nations" clarified the Chancellor. 19
He mentioned that recently a Russian delegation arrived in Caracas as part of the military-technical cooperation between both nations, in force since 2001. In that sense, the diplomat said that Russian military experts "have gone several times" to Caracas to train the Venezuelan military in weapon systems.
"Russian military experts have gone to Venezuela several times (...) but that is not a contingent as they say," responded Arreaza to the questioning about the arrival of a military plane from Russia. Source: RT April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
Venezuela calls to defend multilateralism and peace diplomacy at the UN The Chancellor of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Jorge Arreaza, called on the member states of the United Nations (UN) to defend multilateralism, international law and peace diplomacy during the plenary that took place at the headquarters of the international instance in New York, to celebrate the Day of Multilateralism.
In addition, Arreaza read a statement from the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries (NAM) indicating that "there is an urgent need to promote, defend and strengthen multilateralism and multilateral decision-making processes through the written adherence of the purposes and principles enshrined in our sacred Charter of the United Nations ".
The Venezuelan diplomat said that "we can not fail to insist on the need to reaffirm the full validity of international law set forth in the Charter of the United Nations."
He said that the Member States of the NAM "reiterate their deep concern and strong opposition to the growing tendency to resort to unilateralism, arbitrariness and measures imposed unilaterally."
He also urged the UN General Assembly not to allow this body to be "used to address bilateral issues, much less be a tool to intervene in the internal affairs of a State."
"We call on the members of the international community from the same house and from this emblematic room to join the efforts that we have been advancing from the South to achieve the realization of these three pillars of the organization: peace, development sustainable, and human rights, "he said.
He recalled that the vice president of the United States (USA), Mike Pence in September 2018 "tried to impose the US dictatorship on the UN and to order the governments to shamelessly ignore Venezuela called to defend multilateralism and the peace diplomacy in the UN the credentials of the member states like Venezuela”.
Source:CP April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
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Venezuela will demonstrate in US courts illegality of the theft of Citgo The president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, confirmed that "we will demonstrate in the courts of the United States (USA) this crime against the Venezuelan people", referring to the case where Trump's supremacist government illegally appropriated the refining company Citgo, a subsidiary of the state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela SA (Pdvsa) in the United States.
The National Assembly, which is in contempt and all its acts are null by an opinion of the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ), decided last February the appointment of a board of directors of Citgo, with people with links to oil companies and the sector of finance and food. As part of the unilateral coercive measures, the United States In 2017, it issued an executive order that blocked the issuance of new Pdvsa debt securities, while closing the possibility of continuing to negotiate the previously issued bonds in US banks, said information on the Telesur website. In addition, it prohibited the payment to the Venezuelan State of the dividends and capital operations associated with Citgo Petroleum Corporation.
This Tuesday from the Miraflores Palace, in Caracas, the Head of State denounced that the US is indebted to Citgo for $ 1.3 billion, "with the complicity of the bourgeois National Assembly," which is in contempt and led by Juan Guaidó. This Wednesday through his account on the social network Twitter @NicolasMaduro the national president reiterated his complaint against the US government and "his puppets of the stateless opposition."
It should be noted that President Maduro affirmed on Tuesday that Venezuela has a good chance of winning the lawsuit filed in the United States for the recovery of Citgo. Source: VTV April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
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USA imposes sanctions against Chancellor Jorge Arreaza The foreign minister wrote on his Twitter account that this measure was a reaction with "despair" after his complaint to the UN of the "criminal blockade" of Washington against his country.
The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions this Friday against Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza and US Judge Carol Padilla, according to a statement on its website. In the text, the Secretary of the Treasury, Steven T. Mnuchin, affirms that his country "will not remain" arms crossed "and that" it will continue attacking the corrupt people of Maduro, including those who have the task of directing diplomacy and justice in the name of this illegitimate regime. " Arreaza wrote in his account that these measures against him were a response with "despair" of the US president, Donald Trump, after his speech, last Thursday, before the United Nations (UN), where he denounced "irrefutably the US criminal blockade against Venezuela. " This new punitive measure of Washington against the Minister of Foreign Affairs joins those already imposed on some 70 high officials, including ministers, governors, heads of public and military powers that are part of the Government of Nicolás Maduro, to which the White House considered as "illegitimate" and "undemocratic". On the other hand, Padilla is a judge of the First Special Court of the Metropolitan Area of Caracas, who is running the case against Roberto Marrero, collaborator of the opposition deputy Juan Guaidó, who was arrested for his alleged connection with a terrorist cell that would carry out targeted attacks against political leaders for destabilizing purposes. Source: RT. April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
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Keys to the withdrawal of Venezuela from the OAS With regard to the multiple interventionist actions against the Bolivarian Revolution from the Organization of American States (OAS), on April 26, 2017, Venezuela began the process of withdrawal of this multilateral organization by instruction of President Nicolás Maduro. Next, we offer a set of keys in context and background reading.
1: The articulation from the external front against
Venezuela. Repeatedly, accelerated and successive, from the OAS has been propped up a set of actions clearly interfering with Venezuela, which has consisted in the detonation of coercive acts against the executive government of Venezuela. Expression of this has been the successive attempts to apply the Inter-American Democratic Charter as well as the approval by simple majority of non-binding documents in tort to the Venezuelan institutions.
2:
Destruction of the OAS from its bowels. The withdrawal of Venezuela from that organization is unprecedented because Venezuela invokes Article 143 of the Charter of the Organization Key on the withdrawal of Venezuela from the OAS of American States of 1948. This instrument provides for denunciation by letter to the Secretary General and other member countries , it being noted that, "two years after the date on which the General Secretariat receives a notification of denunciation, this Charter (the founding charter of the OAS) will cease its effects with respect to the denouncing State, and the latter will be disconnected from the Organization after having complied with the obligations emanated from this Charter ".
Consuming these acts, Venezuela marks the fate of an organization that is disarticulated, as a result of clearly interfering spurious acts product of an alignment of right-wing governments in the region, protected from the OAS by the new proto-fascist administration in the United States Government.
3: The trigger, despite the warnings. On the night of
April 25, 2017, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Delcy Rodríguez warned in the Dossier program, along with journalist Walter Martínez, that Venezuela would consider withdrawing from the organization if this body continued to violate its own rules calling the Permanent Council to discuss Venezuela without the blessing of Bolivarian diplomacy. Only hours after this warning and after a nominal vote, was approved with 19 votes in favor of convening a meeting of foreign ministers to discuss the case of the current situation in Venezuela. The head of the Venezuelan delegation, Samuel Moncada, opposed that action saying that "the sovereignty of Venezuela is always defended in any circumstance." He cited Articles 1 and 19 of the OAS Charter as principles that support his rejection, summarized in the fact that it is an interference in the internal affairs of the country he represents, in 23
addition to the fact that a decision on a State is being imposed. sovereign.
4:
Venezuela withdraws due to aggression and interference. "The OAS persisted in interventionist actions against the sovereignty of our country and therefore we will withdraw from the organization." Our historical doctrine is framed in the Bolivarian Diplomacy of Peace that has nothing to do with the OAS, "said the then Foreign Minister Delcy Rodríguez . He also condemned the double standards of the governments of Latin America that refer to the internal affairs of Venezuela and do not address the serious problems of their peoples. "Does the OAS have nothing to say about Argentina, Mexico, Brazil and Colombia? The reality that Venezuela is living today has much to do with its aggression actions, the withdrawal is not conjunctural, it has to do with the dignity of our people" .
5: In the dismantling of the siege from the external
front. Although the definitive withdrawal of Venezuela from the OAS will be consummated in two years, from now on Venezuela assumes itself as a political factor that will deliberate in this instance at discretion, while undertaking its administrative withdrawal. Which also means that from the beginning of sovereignty and self-determination, Venezuela will also determine at
discretion the follow-up or not of different regulations, resolutions or rulings that are decreed against Venezuela from that instance. Some of them, while still in force, could be omitted because they are considered harmful. Others in essence could be openly disrespected.
6: Venezuela takes the turn in its position vis-à-vis the
inter-American system. The inter-American alternative for Venezuela lies in Celac, as a community of nations that politically groups the region from the North American hemisphere to the southern cone, without Canada and the United States being part of this body. What constitutes in essence a rupture of the ostracism and political isolation that from the interventionism is tried to impose against the Bolivarian Revolution and the Venezuelan institutions. In this way, Venezuela embarks on a new type of political career: in the face of the ignominy of the imperial bureaucracy, to resize Venezuela's position before the region and the world simultaneously with the demands and turbulences imposed by the siege.
Source: Misión Verdad April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
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VENEZUELA BUILTS MORE THAN 2 MILLION 600 THOUSAND SOCIAL HOUSING MISSION "So far the Great Housing Mission Venezuela (GMVV) has 2 million 604 thousand 132 homes, that is, the construction is between 10 and 12 homes per day per state", of which 94,124 homes have been executed with international alliance, said the Minister of Popular Power for Housing and Habitat, Ildemaro Villaroel. "We continue to demonstrate that we are a country open to the world, we have alliances with China, Bielarrus, Portugal and we have also had them with Turkey and Brazil," he said. During the interview with a private media outlet, the owner of the Housing portfolio said that these agreements allow complement the national production of construction materials required by the Great Housing Mission Venezuela (GMVV), due to the speed of growth of this social program. As part of the 8th anniversary of the Great Housing Mission Venezuela (GMVV) there will be two important events at the Alba Caracas hotel: the Builders for Peace Congress and the International Forum for Free Venezuela in Human Rights, he said. Villaroel stressed that through the system of registration of the Carnet de la Patria the updating of the official data of the Housing and Habitat Management System (Sigevih) is permanently maintained.
Venezuela, he said, is the only country with a credit system set in installments with terms of up to 35 years, to be able to buy a home from the GMVV: "In no other nation can you get a loan to pay in more than 20 years." He emphasized that there is no type of discrimination or exclusion to acquire the homes of the GMVV: "In our urbanisms there coexist people who think in favor of the Chavista ideology and not chavista". The Minister of Housing pointed out that the war waged from abroad against the Bolivarian nation has had an effect on the production of materials, however, work has not stopped thanks to state companies, such as the Socialist Cement Corporation, Petrocasa , the Siderúrgica and the associated ones through social agreements destined to the GMVV. Source: JML April Bulletin for the Embassy of Venezuela in Bolivia
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The Housing mission “Gran Misión Vivienda Venezuela” celebrates 8 years since its inception
With regard to the eight years of the Great Housing Mission Venezuela (GMVV), the Government of Venezuela reported that 2,621,703 housing complexes have been awarded throughout the country, according to the head of the Ministry of Housing and Housing, Ildemaro Villarroel. The GMVV was devised by the commander Hugo Chávez Frías, in 2011, after the landslide that occurred in the state of Vargas, located on the coast of Venezuela. The first home of the GMVV was awarded in 2011 by Commander Hugo Chávez to a survivor of the Vargas state tragedy, Melania Rendón. The 300,000 milestone was delivered in December 2012 in the Catatumbo Housing Development, in the Manuel Dagnino parish of the Maracaibo municipality, while the 500,000 house was awarded in December 2013 in the Fabricio Ojeda Housing Development, located in the El Menito sector, Lagunillas municipality of the Zulia state. www.telesurtv.net
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VENEZUELA IS USED TO DEFENDING ITSELF ..... AND FIGHTING IMPERIALISM President Hugo Chรกvez
EDITORIAL TEAM: Jose Avila, Keyla Castillo, Milka Aweyo, Fredrick Kasuku, CONTACT: UN Crescent, Opposite Diplomatic Police Gigiri, Nairobi Kenya, P. O. Box 2437- 00621, Tel: (+254 - 20) 712 06 . 48 / 712 06 . 49