Venezuela & ALBA News 12.11.2020 Venezuela Election: Never-ending US Regime Change Suffers Another Defeat

Venezuela

Popular Resistance: Margaret Flowers interviews Vijay Prashad and Paul Dobson (Venezuelanalysis) on the meaning of the Venezuelan election Vijay Prashad: “Poor Nicolas Maduro had to fight against the collapse of oil prices, intensified sanctions from Obama and Trump, and on top of that, a pandemic. This is the situation that Maduro has had to confront. And it’s stunning that people outside Venezuela are willing to just accept the Pompeo position. Even people on the left, in the European and North American left, would so casually say ‘I’m with Chavez, not with Maduro.’ Let me tell you friends on the left, I’m certainly not with you.”

CodePink (Leonardo Flores): Low turnout, but free elections in Venezuela are a blow to regime change The opposition that participated in the election accepted the election’s results, called for reflection and strongly criticized the call for a boycott. One factor that depressed voter participation is a gasoline shortage induced by U.S. sanctions, which made it difficult for some voters to travel to polls. Migration is another factor that artificially reduced turnout. Only citizens who currently reside in the country can vote in legislative elections, but most who left in recent years still appear on voter rolls as living in Venezuela. A further factor is the pandemic. A significant factor in reduced turnout was the extremist opposition’s call for a boycott.

RT (Dan Kovalik): Maduro’s socialist alliance victory in Venezuela’s National Assembly poll is a failure of US sanctions & regime change policy The victory of Maduro’s political alliance in Sunday’s parliamentary election means that despite the Covid pandemic, economic hardships and sanctions by the US, Venezuelans voted for the continuation of the Chavista Revolution. For now, Trump’s policy of trying to provoke regime change in Venezuela has failed. But while the US president’s policies towards Venezuela have been cruel indeed, they are nothing more than an acceleration of the sanctions begun by President Obama in 2015. And it is clear that in one form or another presumed President-elect Joe Biden will continue the regime change efforts of both of these prior administrations, along with the sanctions.

MintPressNews (Alan Macleod): US Media, Pols Rage After Venezuelans Defy US Empire to Re-elect Socialists Guaido backers in the Western press fear the result has neutralized him. The Guardian wrote that yesterday’s events “deal a further blow to Guaidó’s flagging crusade,” quoting bitterly anti-Maduro figure Phil Gunson, who said that “the coalition around Guaidó is really crumbling.” Ultimately,  while turnout was relatively low, the ruling socialist party has gained a supermajority in the one body the opposition-controlled, handing them a clear victory and the U.S. government a defeat. Added to the return of democracy to Bolivia in October and a leftist election victory in Guyana earlier this year, 2020 has not been a good year for Washington in Latin America.

UltimaNoticias: CNE: More than 91% of the seats obtained Chavismo in the parliamentarians The United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) has obtained 253 seats out of 277 in parliament,91% of the seats. Opposition group Acción Democrática reached 11 deputies (6.25%); Avanzada Progresista won 3 seats, as did El Cambio (1.08% each); Venezuela first conquered 2; Copei a deputy (0.36%) and another the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV).

MorningStar: Guaido threatens violent overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro after election boycott failure  US-backed Venezuelan usurper Juan Guaido threatened the violent overthrow of Pres Maduro  as he called for the international community to reject recent election results. Guaido refused to rule out violence to remove the democratically elected Bolivarian leader, saying “we must have all possible alternatives in mind.” “The only option is to keep putting pressure on Maduro because he will not leave power voluntarily.” The former president of the National Assembly has been the figurehead for a series of spectacularly disastrous failed coup attempts launched with the support of the US and other imperialist powers.

Venezuelanalysis: International Observers Present Report on Venezuelan Parliamentary Elections The Latin American Council of Electoral Experts (CEELA) endorsed the legitimacy of Venezuela’s National Assembly elections.

The Grayzone: US Congress and corporate media deploy massive lie, claiming Venezuela’s gov’t threatened to starve non-voters Spun out by the US Congress and Wall Street Journal, the cynical deception is part of an assault on Venezuela’s legislative election, in which even opposition politicians were sanctioned for participating. A bipartisan US congressional letter condemning Venezuela’s election as a “sham” also echoed the opposition leader’s dubious interpretation, stating, “the regime has threatened to withhold food from Venezuelans who do not vote in the sham elections.”

Orinoco Tribune: Assassination Attempt: Why President Maduro Changed his Voting Center at the Last Minute Pres Maduro explained that the attack was the reason behind the change of his voting center, because “information reached us through highly reliable Colombian intelligence sources that they were preparing an attack to assassinate me on election day, live and direct,” he said. “We were confirming the information, and my security team made the decision to recommend a change of my voting center, because it was precisely a fixed day, in a fixed place. From the Casa de Nariño, Iván Duque himself participated in the plans to try to assassinate me on election day,” added the president.

PressTV: Largest-Yet Fleet of Iranian Tankers on its Way to Venezuela (Bloomberg report) The biggest Iranian fleet of tankers is reportedly en route to Venezuela carrying fuel for the South American oil-producing country, which is suffering from a severe gasoline shortage.

Citing unnamed people with knowledge of the matter, Bloomberg reported that some of the flotilla of about 10 Iranian vessels will also help export Venezuelan crude after discharging fuel. The shipment comes in defiance of illegal US sanctions targeting both Tehran and Caracas.

 

Cuba

NACLA: Interview with the makers of “The War on Cuba” Documentary 

Helen Yaffe film: Cuba & COVID 19 Public Health, Science and Solidarity

BuzzFeedNews: Scientists Are Slamming A Report Saying Microwave Attacks Could Have Caused “Havana Syndrome” In US Diplomats Scientists who collaborated on the National Academies of Sciences report, commissioned by the US State Department, say that the finding about possible microwave attacks is far from conclusive. Outside experts on microwaves and the mysterious “Havana syndrome,” meanwhile, dismissed it as implausible. One scientist dubbed it “science fiction.”

Past and Future Webinars

Video: How US Unconventional Warfare in Nicaragua Utilizes Human Rights Organizations Camilo Mejia, Nicaraguan/US analyst and writer, former Amnesty International prisoner of conscience; John Perry, long-time writer and Nicaragua resident.

Video: Venezuela Votes in Defiance of US Calls for Election Boycott: The Meaning of the Results with Jesus Rodriguez and William Camacaro. Sponsored by Chicago ALBA Solidarity, Orinoco Tribune, Task Force on the Americas, Alberto Lovera Bolivarian Circle of New York, Frente para la Defensa de los Pueblos Hugo Chavez, Alliance for Global Justice

December 12: Eyewitness Venezuela: A critical victory – the struggle continues  with Gloria La Riva, Manolo de los Santos, Kei Pritsker

December 17: Hybrid War & Resistance in Venezuela Gsus García (spokesperson for Comuna de Altos de Lidice),-Vijay Prashad, Zoe PC (journalist, People’s Dispatch),

Hector Figarella (Venezuelan-American activist with the Anti-Imperialist Action Committee and Latin American Solidarity Committee), Adrienne Pine (Venezuelan Embassy protector)

December 17: Zoom Meeting to Celebrate the 6th Anniversary of the Historic Announcement by Presidents Obama and Castro of Normal Diplomatic Relations And Learn How Travel to Cuba Will be (?) Restored by the Biden-Harris Administration

Delegation: Sanctions Kill and Friends of ATC Delegation to Nicaragua January 30 – February 9, 2020

Please Donate: Emergency Relief for Nicaragua Hurricane Recovery+

Nicaragua: Support Agroecology and Food Sovereignty Organizing

 

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