The PP takes its war against the Government of Sánchez for Venezuela to Brussels

The Popular Party has found in the EU's relations with Venezuela a weapon to charge against the Government of Pedro Sánchez in Brussels.

The head of European diplomacy, the socialist Josep Borrell, will appear this week in the European Parliament after the popular, supported by Ciudadanos and Vox, accused him of following the dictates of Sánchez by sending a community mission to Caracas to request a postponement of the elections.

The European Commission rejects these assertions and the European left denounces a strategy of erosion of the Spanish Executive in Brussels by the popular.

The offensive by Venezuela joins other previous attempts to delegitimize the government on account of the state of alarm or the negotiation of the European recovery fund.

The president of the PP, Pablo Casado, said before entering the meetings of his European family, prior to the summits of heads of state and government, that he was not going to Brussels to speak ill of Spain.

Without leaving Madrid, last week the head of the PP met with the ambassadors of all the EU countries accredited in Spain.

According to the party itself, in that meeting he raised several of the issues that have caused clashes with the Government, such as the Monarchy or the recovery plans.

At the meeting, held at the German embassy in Madrid, he also expressed his rejection of the EU mission in Caracas and warned, according to the PP, that "it is not possible to dialogue" with Maduro.

The diplomatic trip denounced by the popular ones took place from September 22 to 26, when two high community officials went to Caracas.

There they met with members of the Maduro government, opposition leaders and representatives of civil society, such as the Catholic Church.

According to community sources, Brussels fears that the legislative elections on December 6 will definitely separate Venezuela from the international community.

These sources reason that, without time to organize an observation delegation, these elections could not be recognized and the figure of the "president in charge" that Juan Guaidó now occupies would remain in the air.

The diplomats asked the Maduro regime for more time, although it has so far responded that it will not delay the elections.

"You cannot whitewash a totalitarian regime like Maduro's or go against the EU's position on Venezuela," said Dolors Montserrat, the leader of the popular Spaniards in the European Parliament, on his Twitter account.

Community sources defend that this dialogue is endorsed by the International Contact Group, which seeks a solution to the crisis in Venezuela, and by the Council of Foreign Ministers of the EU itself.

And they say they are surprised that European parliamentarians endorse a "hard line" more typical of the Donald Trump Administration than of the European Foreign Ministries.

Casado met by videoconference last Friday with the Venezuelan opposition.

Among other issues, the EU diplomatic trip was addressed and the popular leader charged Borrell for "skipping the democratic confinement of the Maduro regime."

Previously, Casado had signed a letter with the leader of Vox, Santiago Abascal;

the deputy mayor of Madrid, Begoña Villacís, and several former Latin American leaders and members of the Venezuelan opposition in which they ugly Borrell who acts as an "ally of the Spanish Government" and charged against the PSOE and Podemos.

It is not the first time that the Venezuelan situation has been debated in the European Parliament.

So far this legislature, there have already been six debates and three resolutions.

Many of them have been rough and carried out by Spanish deputies.

"It is almost an internal issue that they bring to the European Parliament," argue parliamentary sources.

Last February, there was an agitated debate over the meeting of the Minister of Transport, José Luis Ábalos and the Venezuelan Vice President, Delcy Rodríguez, at the Barajas airport.

The president of the social democratic group in the European Parliament, Iratxe García, attributes this action of the Spanish PP to his "disappearance" in the Chamber.

"At a delicate moment, with priorities such as the economic recovery plan, the PP is dedicated to attacking the Government of Spain with the argument of Venezuela," says García, who describes it as "irresponsible."

The deputy of En Comú Podem and Los Verdes, Ernest Urtasun, points out that the PP is following a "strategy of attrition of the Government in Europe".

"It was quite shameful the way Casado met with the ambassadors to tell them that the Government does not prepare well for the management of European funds," adds the deputy, who calls the attitude of the popular as "unfair".

The European left recalls previous attempts by the Spanish PP to torpedo the performance of the Executive of Pedro Sánchez. For example, when the popular Europeans aligned themselves with the

to ask for more macroeconomic conditionality in community funds or when last June Dolors Montserrat sent a letter to the Justice Commissioner, Didier Reynders, to express his "well-founded concern" about the "Abuses" that, in his opinion, were committed by the coalition government during the state of alarm. And far from abating, everything points to the fact that the storm in Venezuela will get worse. Parliamentary sources indicate that next November the Petitions Committee, chaired by Montserrat, could examine the matter of Delcy Rodríguez's trip to Barajas.