The diplomatic silence

By: Luis Gonzales Posada - 15/03/2024

It is politically amoral that some democratic governments in Latin America continue to be indifferent and in stony silence in the face of the advance of a rapacious dictatorship like the Venezuelan one, which has called presidential elections for next July 28.

The electoral body of the Chavista regime made the announcement maintaining the veto of the opposition candidate, María Corina Machado (MCM), despite the fact that in the agreements reached with the United States in Bridgetown, capital of Barbados, they committed to annulling the disqualifications. and release political prisoners – 294 remain in captivity – in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.

Let us remember that the aforementioned agreement, signed on October 17, 2023, stipulates that "both parties recognize and respect the right of each political actor to choose their candidate for the presidential elections freely and in accordance with their internal mechanisms."

Six days later, on October 23, in response to that international commitment, MCM ran for the primary elections, winning 92.5% of the votes, representing 2 million 200 thousand votes cast in 28 nations.

Upon learning the results, Maduro panicked because, in addition, the polls project that MCM would win comfortably. The mega-analysis company, in fact, registered a difference in voting intention of 4 to 1: 50.1% to 12.1%.

Maduro's arrogant response was to kick the board and on February 4 he said that "we will win by hook or by crook." Likewise, in his repressive escalation, he ordered the imprisoning of opposition campaign commandos and prohibiting them from selling air tickets to MCM to make their territorial movement difficult.

When we emphasize silence we are referring, among other governments, to Peru, where more than one and a half million llaneros have migrated, of the 8 million dispersed around the world.

Unlike us, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, the United States, Canada and 27 governments of the European community have protested against the upcoming electoral fraud. Likewise, 25 former Hispanic American leaders of the Idea Group and 497 members of the Parliament of the Old Continent have expressed their repudiation of this caricature of elections.

I have always thought that the greatest tool that Maduro has to perpetuate himself in power is the docile tolerance of the democratic regimes in the region, which allow him to continue committing political tricks. I naturally exclude the dictatorships of Nicaragua and Cuba, which openly support Chavista repression, as do Iran and Russia, their extra-continental allies.

Unfortunately, remaining silent has become a sordid diplomatic practice.

Not a word, for example, about the illegal sentences to sentences between 5 and 25 years in prison against 297 young Cubans who in 2021 demonstrated peacefully in demand of freedoms and greater well-being.

Silence, also, in relation to the imprisonment of the former Bolivian president Jeanine Áñez and the governor of Santa Cruz, Luis Fernando Camacho, subjected to cruel treatment in prison with the consent of President Luis Arce and Evo Morales.

And the same cover-up practice is applied with the Nicaraguan satrap Daniel Ortega, responsible for 300 murders, confiscating companies and media outlets, assaulting temples, appropriating property of the Catholic Church and deporting hundreds of citizens.

Why is the Government of Dina Boluarte silent? Are you afraid of the insults that Maduro will heap on you or are you simply doing it because it represents the continuity of the foreign policy of Pedro Castillo, whose vice president and minister she was?

Torre Tagle must defend democratic principles and values, as well as human rights.

It is the least that Latin American democrats can expect in support of María Corina Machado, with the addition of committing to not recognize the results of the elections if the opposition candidate does not participate.

This is how the Lima Group proceeded, calling Maduro's 2019 re-election fraudulent and not validating the results, until Castillo arrived and recognized him as legitimate president. By doing so, we become accomplices of a sinister dictator who blackmails by not receiving the criminals of the Aragua Train who must be extradited to Venezuela.

Given the serious events that occur in the land of the Liberator, we hope that the president and the chancellery will speak out because, if they do not, history will record that deplorable silence.

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