[News] Guaido Requests US Military ‘Cooperation’ to Oust Maduro as US Vessel Violates Venezuelan Waters

Tue May 14 12:04:49 EDT 2019

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14486

  Guaido Requests US Military ‘Cooperation’ to Oust Maduro as US Vessel
  Violates Venezuelan Waters

By Paul Dobson - May 13, 2019
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Merida, May 13, 2019 (venezuelanalysis.com 
<http://venezuelanalysis.com/>) – Self-declared “Interim President” Juan 
Guaido has ordered the setting up of a meeting with the US Armed Forces 
to discuss “cooperation” in his efforts to oust President Nicolas Maduro.

During a gathering of supporters in the upper middle class Caracas 
district of Las Mercedes on Saturday, Guaido informed that he was 
instructing his representative in the United States, Carlos Vecchio, to 
establish a “direct relationship” with the US Southern Command 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Southern_Command> 
(SouthCom), which plans, oversees, and controls 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/13042> all US overt and covert 
military operations in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The initiative by Guaido stokes increasing fears that he looks to oust 
Maduro using a foreign-led intervention. Italian newspaper La Stampa 
<https://www.lastampa.it/2019/05/10/esteri/juan-guaid-ora-vorrei-parlare-con-conte-per-spiegargli-il-nostro-dramma-fDwgEeKXdxcw2q8bnBt0SJ/premium.html> 
published an interview with Guaido Friday, in which the opposition 
leader explained that “If the North Americans proposed a military 
intervention, I would probably accept it.”

In a letter to US SouthCom chief Admiral Craig Faller Monday, Vecchio 
requested a meeting to discuss “strategic and operational” cooperation, 
alongside concerns over what he describes as “the [existing] presence of 
un-invited foreign forces” in Venezuela. No evidence for this claim was 
provided by Vecchio.

    #Venezuela
    <https://twitter.com/hashtag/Venezuela?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>:
    following instructions of Interim President @jguaido
    <https://twitter.com/jguaido?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>, we officially
    requested the @Southcom
    <https://twitter.com/Southcom?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw> a meeting with a
    technical delegation to advance in strategic and operational
    planning with the priority goal of stopping our people's suffering
    and restoring democracy. pic.twitter.com/x3ckEn39cM
    <https://t.co/x3ckEn39cM>

    — CARLOS VECCHIO (@carlosvecchio) May 13, 2019
    <https://twitter.com/carlosvecchio/status/1127911954474049537?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw>

Venezuelan authorities were quick to respond to the opposition’s move, 
with Vice President Delcy Rodriguez qualifying it as “repulsive” and 
“doomed to fail.” Recent polls 
<https://thegrayzone.com/2019/01/29/venezuelans-oppose-intervention-us-sanctions-poll/> 
suggest that over 86 percent of Venezuelans oppose a foreign-led 
military incursion into the country.

While SouthCom are yet to confirm if they will meet Guaido’s team, 
Faller had earlier tweeted that he looked forward to discussing how to 
“restore [the] constitutional order” in Venezuela and that his forces 
stood “ready.”

Guaido and US officials have repeatedly stated that all options 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14295>, including a military 
intervention, are “on the table.” However, other countries that have 
voiced support for Guaido have publicly rejected the possibility of 
intervention, including Chile 
<http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-04/13/c_137973729.htm>, Peru 
<https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Peru-President-Rejects-Military-Intervention-in-Venezuela-20190206-0016.html>, 
Colombia 
<https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-colombia/military-intervention-not-an-answer-for-venezuela-colombia-president-tells-paper-idUSKCN1QW19T>, 
Spain 
<https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/05/08/world/americas/ap-lt-venezuela-the-latest.html?searchResultPosition=4> 
and Canada 
<https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-canada-says-it-opposes-military-intervention-in-venezuela-as-lima/>.

The overtures to the US SouthCom come on the heels of a failed military 
putsch on April 30 <https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14453> and 
numerous unheeded calls by Guaido for the Venezuelan armed forces 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14266> to support him.

After swearing himself in as “interim president” on January 23 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14244>, the National Assembly 
president received the backing ofroughly 25 percent of the world’s 
governments <https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/14303>. His 
unsuccessful efforts to remove the Maduro government, which included a 
humanitarian aid <https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14347> “showdown” on 
the Colombian-Venezuelan border, have seen his support dwindle 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14458> in numbers.

      More sanctions from Washington

Guaido’s call for cooperation with the US military came as Washington 
unveiled a new set of sanctions against Venezuela on Friday.

The latestmeasures 
<https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/Pages/20190510.aspx> 
added two private oil shipping firms, Monsoon Navigation Corporation and 
Serenity Maritime Limited based in the Marshall Islands and Liberia 
respectively, to the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets 
Control (OFAC) blacklist. Two Panamanian oil tankers associated with 
these firms, the Leon Dias Chemical and Ocean Elegance, were also named.

According to the Treasury Department, the firms and tankers have 
delivered crude oil from Venezuela to Cuba since late 2018. Venezuela 
delivers around 50,000 
<https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-venezuela-oil-exports/venezuelan-pdvsas-oil-exports-steady-in-april-flow-to-cuba-continues-data-idUKKCN1S82BN> 
barrels per day of crude to Cuba as part of wide ranging cooperation 
agreements which include the presence of roughly 20,000 Cuban medical 
and agricultural technicians in Venezuela.

The sanctions followsimilar measures announced in April 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14423>, while the Venezuelan economy 
has recently seen restrictions imposed on its banking 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14398> and mining 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14396> sectors, as well as ade facto 
oil embargo <https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14268>.

Similarly, Guaido also called on those European countries which 
recognise him as the “legitimate” president to “amplify” economic 
sanctions against Caracas this weekend, as well as urging assistance in 
international courts to oust Maduro.

Sanctions have repeatedly been declaredillegal 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/13614> by independent 
multilateral agencies. Recentcomments 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14474> from the UN Special Rapporteur 
Idriss Jazairy argued that the sanctions also violatehuman rights 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/14283>, while an April report 
from the Washington-based Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) 
indicated that US economic sanctions have directly caused over 40,000 
deaths <https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14453> in Venezuela since 2017.

Apart from calling for more sanctions, Guaido also urged European 
governments to grant “maximum legitimacy” to his appointed 
representatives. European governments largely continue to have complete 
or partial diplomatic relations with the ambassadors named by the Maduro 
administration.

Efforts by Guaido’s representative in the US, Carlos Vecchio, totake 
over the vacated embassy building in Washington 
<https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/14443> also continue to be 
frustrated by a group of US solidarity movements who have been occupying 
the building, with the permission of the Venezuelan government, since 
April 12.

      US coast guard vessel penetrates Venezuelan waters

Amidst discussions of military “cooperation,” tensions remained high 
following the incursion of an armed US Coast Guard patrol vessel into 
Venezuelan waters on Thursday.

Action was taken by the Venezuelan Navy and Air Force when the USCG 
James approached a distance of 13 nautical miles (15 miles) off 
Venezuela’s northern coast. The vessel changed course away from 
Venezuela’s coastline following a radio request to do so.

According to US Southern Command spokesperson Colonel Amanda Azubuike, 
the vessel was carrying out “a mission to intercept drugs.”

“I don’t know if other Republics would accept actions like these in 
their maritime jurisdiction, but we won’t,” Venezuelan Defence Minister 
Vladimir Padrino Lopez stated Saturday, describing the incident as a 
“provocation.”

“All operations of law enforcement in this place where the US vessel was 
correspond to Venezuela by international law. This was an armed coast 
guard patrolling these waters,” he went on to state.

The USCG James was detected in the so-calledcontiguous zone 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Territorial_waters#Contiguous_zone> of 
Venezuelan waters which covers 12-24 miles from the coastline. In this 
maritime band and according to international law, the free passage of 
foreign ships is allowed, but Caracas has full sovereignty in political, 
migratory, border, sanitary, and fiscal matters, including law 
enforcement and “intercepting drugs.”

According to the US Navy website 
<https://www.atlanticarea.uscg.mil/Area-Cutters/CGCJAMES/>, the USCG 
James (WMSL 754) is one of the most advanced patrol vessels in its 
fleet, carrying modern surveillance and reconnaissance equipment, as 
well as being able to serve as a command post for “complex law 
enforcement and national security missions involving the Coast Guard and 
numerous partner agencies.”

The border incursion comes as Caracas reopened its borders with Brazil 
and the Dutch island of Aruba on Friday, in efforts to boost border 
trade. The borders had been closed for over three months since Guaido’s 
failed attempt to force humanitarian “aid” into the country on February 
23 <https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14347>.

/Edited by Ricardo Vaz from Caracas./

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