Venezuelan National Assembly President Juan Guaido, the opposition leader, on Saturday launched what he promised would be a “definitive” escalation of pressure to force the country’s embattled leftist leader from office.
Addressing a giant anti-government rally in Caracas, Guaido — whose claim to be interim president is supported by about 50 nations — kicked off what he called “Operation Liberty,” his plan to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
“Everyone to the streets, let’s start the final phase of the end of the usurpation,” he told supporters, speaking from the back of a pickup truck.
Photo: Reuters
He called for a huge nationwide turnout on Wednesday, and urged his followers to redouble their efforts to maintain pressure in the streets.
“The greatest escalation of pressure we have seen in our history” has begun, Guaido said.
His call comes amid massive blackouts and the collapse of water supplies affecting the nation, further exacerbated a growing political crisis.
At the rally, Guaido also warned Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel that the supply of subsidized Venezuelan oil to the Caribbean nation was over.
Venezuela has been sending cheap oil to Cuba in exchange for labor from Cuban doctors and teachers, but Guaido said the oil was actually financing a Cuban intelligence group known as G2 that was cracking down on Maduro opponents in the Venezuelan military.
“The exploitation of Venezuelan oil is over, so Mr Diaz-Canel ... Venezuelan oil will not be used to submit and investigate our military officials” through the G2, he told the crowd.
Pro-Guaido protests on Saturday drew thousands in rallies across the country.
A pro-Maduro counter-demonstration in Caracas, with supporters dressed in red, drew a large crowd that gathered at the Miraflores presidential palace.
“Together, permanently mobilized, let’s keep defending national peace and independence; no more interference!” Maduro tweeted.
Later, he called upon Mexico and Uruguay to relaunch their proposal for dialogue to resolve the crisis without foreign intervention, an idea they first proposed in January.
Two opposition deputies were detained at an anti-government demonstration in the western city of Maracaibo, but a few hours later Guaido announced that the two had been released.
Venezuelan lawmaker Elimar Diaz, who marched in Maracaibo, said protest there had encountered “brutal repression,” including tear gas canisters dropped from helicopters, the use of Venezuelan National Guard armored vehicles and attacks by members of the pro-government militia, known as “colectivos.”
Diaz said people in Maracaibo had gone “days without electricity” amid “inhumane rationing.”
Maduro on Saturday said that attacks on electricity infrastructure had been carried out from Chile and Colombia with US support.
The opposition blames a failure to maintain critical infrastructure for the blackouts, which have deprived millions of power.
Washington is keeping up the international pressure on Maduro, with US Vice President Mike Pence on Friday announcing fresh sanctions against 34 vessels belonging to Venezuela’s state oil company.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion