Nicolás Maduro arrived this Saturday driving a car to the doors of the National Palace. At the wheel, the Venezuelan president paused for a few seconds for the cameras to capture what is his first international trip since 2020, when the United States accused him of terrorism and drug trafficking and offered a reward of 15 million dollars for his capture. He went through the same door that Ken Salazar, the new US ambassador to Mexico, walked through three days earlier to present his diplomatic credentials to President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Maduro's presence at the summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) has shaken the meeting that sought to address the cohesion of the participating countries.
Maduro has intervened - seated opposite López Obrador at the debate table - with a double message. The Venezuelan president has faced, on the one hand, the presidents of Paraguay, Mario Abdo Benítez, and of Uruguay, Luis Lacalle Pou, who had shown their discomfort at sharing the conclave with him. On the other, he has appealed to dialogue. The Bolivarian leader, one of the most questioned and diplomatically isolated figures in the region, has defended not only his own government, but also that of Cuba, which has been helping to consolidate Chavismo for years. And even with that of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, an authoritarian regime that has just ordered the arrest of former vice president and writer Sergio Ramírez.
"We must turn the page of divisiveness that was inserted in Latin America, of the harassment of the Bolivarian revolution and now of the incessant harassment of the Cuban revolution and the Nicaraguan revolution," Maduro emphasized before adding: "We would have enough stones to throw against some of you, but we did not come to throw stones ”.
"I believe that we must go to the construction of a new institutionality of CELAC, to resume the one that began to be built because, here, an institutionality that was beginning to work began to be built," he said.
This new institutionality of the multilateral organization is one of the goals of the host, López Obrador, and his Executive, who seek to turn this forum into an alternative to the Organization of American States (OAS).
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The Paraguayan president's comments were the first to lead the debate towards Maduro. "My presence at this summit in no sense or circumstance represents recognition of the Government of Mr. Nicolás Maduro," Benítez said as soon as he began his speech. But it was the words of the Uruguayan Lacalle, which led Maduro to prepare a response to the accusations. "Participating in this forum does not mean being complacent (...) when one sees that in certain countries there is no full democracy, when the separation of powers is not respected, when the repressive apparatus is used from the power to silence protests, When opponents are imprisoned, when their human rights are not respected, we, in this calm but firm voice, must say with concern that we seriously see what is happening in Cuba,in Nicaragua and in Venezuela, ”Lacalle said.
Maduro's participation in the meeting, after his unexpected arrival in Mexico City on Friday night, comes amid favorable conditions facilitated by the Mexican president. López Obrador this week added Cuban Miguel Díaz-Canel to the celebration of Independence Day and took advantage of the symbolism of the acts to spin a plea in favor of the sovereignty of Havana and ask his American counterpart, Joe Biden, to lift the economic blockade of the island. Díaz-Canel requested a second intervention at the CELAC summit to claim the accusations. "The mention that President Lacalle made about Cuba denotes his ignorance of reality, the courage and freedom of the Cuban people has been demonstrated for six decades in the face of aggression and the blockade of the United States," he mentioned.
Mexico has been the venue since last August for the umpteenth attempt at dialogue between the Venezuelan government and representatives of the majority opposition. That negotiating table was installed under the auspices of Norway, although Washington is closely monitoring its development and the White House has been open to relaxing the sanctions that weigh on Venezuela if the official delegation, headed by Jorge Rodríguez, shows signs of wanting to dialogue seriously and willing to call elections with guarantees and international observation. Maduro has challenged the leaders who indicated him at the summit to go to Venezuela in the elections called for next November 21. “I invite you, go, to see the electoral campaign, to see the elections, to see the dictator Maduro how he calls election number 29.All the opposition has signed up, well, welcome, whoever has to win wins.
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