Interview with former Mexican Foreign Minster Jorge Castañeda
Jorge Castañeda: Cuba is the only government that truly has influence over Maduro and the Venezuelan Armed Forces.
By Carlos F. Chamorro (Confidencial)
HAVANA TIMES – After the validation of the electoral fraud in Venezuela, decreed on August 22 by the Supreme Court controlled by Nicolas Maduro, the diplomatic efforts of Latin American presidents Luiz Inacio Lula, Gustavo Petro, and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador “have been truncated.” The demand that the National Electoral Council present the breakdown of the electoral results has been practically rejected, according to former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castañeda.
“The current situation favors Maduro; time works in his favor, while Lula, Petro, and Lopez Obrador, to a lesser extent, are somewhat frustrated,” summarizes the political analyst and former diplomat, who also does not believe that an “ultimatum or sanctions from Latin American countries could have any effect.”
In a conversation with the program Esta Semana to be broadcast on Sunday, August 25, on the CONFIDENCIAL YouTube channel, Castañeda argues that a fundamental actor has been missing in the negotiation to find a solution to the Venezuelan crisis: the Cuban government, which is the only one that truly has influence over (Nicolas) Maduro. While “Cuban military personnel control the security and intelligence rings of Maduro’s government,” it is impossible to create “a division within the Armed Forces, which is the only possibility of an internal change in Venezuela that could lead to a democratic outcome.”
Given the severity of the economic crisis in Cuba, the former Mexican Foreign Minister suggests offering Cuba “full normalization with the United States or at least to the level reached by Obama in 2015, to incentivize a negotiated solution in Venezuela,” with the participation and cooperation of the Cuban regime.
The Supreme Court validated the electoral fraud of July 28 without presenting any evidence. The United States, the European Union, and ten other Latin American countries reject the ratification of Maduro as the alleged winner of the elections and demand the publication of the detailed voting results by the Electoral Council. What happens to the diplomatic initiative of Lula, Petro, and Lopez Obrador?
Well, it’s truncated because the insistence of these three governments, especially by Lula and Gustavo Petro in Colombia, on the publication of the detailed voting records has obviously been rejected, though not explicitly by Maduro. We are almost a month past the elections, and the precinct results have not been published, and it’s obvious they won’t be.
Lopez Obrador made a somewhat strange statement when he claimed that the Electoral Chamber of the Supreme Court recommended the publication of the precinct tally sheets. This is not true. It recommended the publication of the results.
So, the internal legal channels in Venezuela regarding the elections are exhausted. What can leaders like Lula, Petro, or Lopez Obrador do? Maybe set a deadline, a kind of ultimatum to Maduro: publish the records by such a date or something. And then, what’
