Venezuela’s Juan Guaido is planning to make his largest withdrawal from Venezuelan accounts that have been frozen by US sanctions. Guaido has the power to access these funds because the US recognizes him as Venezuela’s president, despite the reality that Nicolas Maduro holds the office in Caracas.
Guaido is tapping $152 million from the accounts. $100 million is said to be going towards purchasing vaccines through the World Health Organization. It’s not clear what the remaining funds will be used for. According to Bloomberg, at least $23 million will go towards what is called “defending democracy,” and $2.3 million will be spent on “advising, security and travel costs” of Guaido’s “inner circle.”
The US has recognized Juan Guaido as the president of Venezuela since January 2019. The recognition has come along with crushing economic sanctions that have devastated Venezuela’s civilian population.
Guaido was never a viable candidate to replace Maduro, and after a failed coup attempt and repeated calls for US intervention, he lost what little support he had in the country. Even US allies that have gone along with the regime change effort are pulling support from Guaido. After he lost his seat in the National Assembly, the EU said it no longer recognizes Guaido as president.
The Biden administration appears to have no interest in changing the Trump administration’s Venezuela policy and giving the country sanctions relief. Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke with Guaido in March and reaffirmed that the US recognizes him as president.
how the hell can you recognise someone as president when he / she hasn`t been elected by the people ? , how perverse is that , however anyone witha brain knowswhy the Americans want regime change in Venzuela is the oil Trump said it.
“how the hell can you recognise someone as president when he / she hasn`t been elected by the people ?”
Good question.
Of course, even if one believes that the 2018 election was free and fair, Nicolas Maduro was elected by a whopping 21% of “the people.”
That’s 21% more than Guaido.
True. Guaido’s presidency is based on the National Assembly’s rejection of the election as invalid. Under Venezuela’s constitution, if the presidency is vacant, the president of the Assembly becomes the acting president.
I really like to know where you got your 21% source from.
From the government of Venezuela’s National Election Commission. It says Maduro received 6,244,016 votes. That’s 21% of Venezuela’s population.
That’s almost 70 million in the US.