Situation increasingly tense in Venezuela after the elections of July 28th that they saw a new statement from the incumbent president Nicholas Madurowith 51.2% of the preferences, compared to the 44% obtained by the right-wing candidate Edmund Gonzalez. The president of the National Electoral Council of Venezuela today published a second election bulletin confirming the victory Maduro. The government-controlled institution says the Chavista leader won 51.95 percent of the vote with nearly 97 percent of the ballots counted.
The opposition has spoken but immediately of fraud and the leader of the front against Maduro, Maria Corina Machado, invites, again, people to take to the streets on Saturday “in ‘all the cities of the country'”. The opposition has set up a platform that allows viewing the minutes of the ballot boxes from which González would appear to be the winner with 70% of the preferences.
The US Secretary of State on Thursday evening Antony Blinken he stated that “Given the overwhelming evidenceit is clear to the United States and, more importantly, to the Venezuelan people that Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia has won the majority of votes in the July 28 presidential election in Venezuela.” There has been bad blood between Washington and Caracas for some time and it is no secret that Maduro is seen as a pain in the ass. The United States has “authorized” Edmundo González to “self-proclaimed president of Venezuela “in the streets on August 3rd”, says the permanent representative of Venezuela to the United Nations, Samuel Moncadaarguing that Washington “never cared to know how they voted for Venezuelans
Following the American one, other awards have arrived for Gonzalez today. First the one from Argentinaof the far-right ultra-liberal Javier Milei and, shortly after, those of theUruguay and Ecuador. “Several days after the publication of the official electoral minutes of Venezuela” by the opposition “we can all confirm, without a doubt, that the legitimate winner and elected president is Edmundo González,” wrote the Argentine Foreign Minister in X, Diana Mondino. The choice of the platform is perhaps not accidental given that the owner Elon Musk he openly expressed himself in favor of Gonzalez, contesting the legitimacy of the votes.
The President of Russia Vladimir Putin Instead, he invited Maduro to the next BRICS summit scheduled for October in the Russian city of Kazan. Iran says it is against foreign interference in the vote. In a joint statement on Thursday, the foreign ministries of Brazil, Colombia and Mexico They asked Venezuelan electoral authorities to “proceed quickly and make public the data broken down by polling station.”
The Venezuelan NGO Victim’s Monitor has meanwhile reported that up until yesterday 21 deaths were recordedincluding four unidentified, in addition to dozens of injured, in the context of the protests erupted in the country. The opposition denounces a “escalation” of persecutions by the government towards their representatives and in particular towards scrutineers and list representatives who participated in the electoral process.
In this scenario of growing tension and uncertainty, the Venezuelan government expelled the Italian journalist Marco BarilettiRai correspondent, and his cameraman Ivo Bonitoafter they had just landed at theinternational airport Simón Bolívar of Maiquetía. The same fate befell a crew from Chilean National Television (TVN). Since the elections, the NGO Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has denounced the exponential increase in attacks against Venezuelan and foreign journalists. In a statement, RSF assured that it will “continue to monitor cases of attacks on journalists and obstruction of the work of the press”.
