Venezuelan Government Invites Guaido to Negotiating Table: Venezuelan Foreign Minister

UN- The Venezuelan government invites opposition leader Juan Guaido to sit at the negotiating table in order to forge a mutually acceptable solution to the ongoing political crisis, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza told the UN Security Council on Tuesday.

“The coup has failed. It’s time to return to common sense. We expect [Juan] Guaido to sit at the negotiating table with the government in order to forge our own solution to the crisis, without anyone else’s interference from the outside,” Arreaza said, according to Itar Tass.

 Among possible solutions, Venezuela’s top diplomat named “elections and other political options.”

Juan Guaido, Venezuelan opposition leader and parliament speaker, whose appointment to that position had been cancelled by the country’s Supreme Court, declared himself interim president at a rally in the country’s capital of Caracas on January 23. Several countries, including the United States, Lima Group members (excluding Mexico), as well as the Organization of American States, recognized him as president. Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro blasted these actions as an attempted coup and said that he was cutting diplomatic ties with the United States.

In contrast, Russia, Belarus, Bolivia, Iran, China, Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Syria and Turkey voiced support for Maduro.

Russia ready to mediate Venezuela crisis

Russia is ready to render all possible assistance in the search for a compromise between Venezuela’s conflicting political forces, Russia’s UN envoy Vasily Nebenzya told the UN Security Council on Tuesday.

“On our part, we are ready to assist in the search for mutual understanding between all constructive and patriotically-minded forces in Venezuela,” he said.

The Russian diplomat also warned against the military scenario, saying that it would entail “most severe consequences for the region.”

Nebenzya also requested all countries in the region “to firmly declare their support of the UN Charter, rejection of threats to use force, use of force and flagrant interference into a sovereign state’s internal affairs.”

He also said that Russia has prepared a draft Security Council statement on Venezuela, similar to the one adopted for Haiti on the US initiative.

“On February 21, the US delegation came forward with a draft UN Security Council media statement on events in Haiti, which received unanimous support from all members of the UN Security Council,” Nebenzya said, addressing US Special Representative for Venezuela Elliott Abrams. “Are our US colleagues ready to adopt a similar text regarding Venezuela in the form of a statement by the UN Security Council chair?”

“It’s hard not to notice that it [the text] concerns a practically identical situation. The only difference is that in Haiti’s case, Washington has decided to support the legitimate government, at least for now,” the Russian diplomat added.

H.M