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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element"> <font
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href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US-Siding-With-Anti-Democratic-Forces-in-Venezuela-20181212-0031.html">https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/US-Siding-With-Anti-Democratic-Forces-in-Venezuela-20181212-0031.html</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">US Siding With Anti-Democratic Forces
in Venezuela</h1>
Published 12 December 2018</div>
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<p>A day after the landslide victory of the United
Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) in the <a
href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/PSUV-Wins-Majority-in-Local-Elections-Venezuelan-Authorities-20181209-0021.html"
target="_blank">municipal elections</a> on Sunday, the
Embassy of the United States in Caracas tweeted against
their validity despite the wide participation of local
political forces and opposition parties.</p>
<p>“The elections for municipal councils, in which the
regime of #Maduro discredited the opposition parties,
were deeply defective. We support those committed with
democracy and we call for the regime to reestablish it
in #Venezuela,” the embassy tweeted on Monday.</p>
<p>Venezuelan citizens and foreigners with more than 10
years residing in the country were able to elect 4,900
councilors and their deputy posts, for which 51
political organizations participated including 21 which
are national political parties, 11 regional, five
national Indigenous parties, and 14 regional Indigenous
organizations. The most popular right-wing parties
decided to abstain, but Democratic Action and First
Justice did participate.</p>
<p>Election after election, the U.S. and other countries
have supported the opposition parties’ decision to
abstain from the process, leading to strong victories by
the PSUV, President Nicolas Maduro’s party, and allies.
Despite the failure of the strategy, the embassy argues
the electoral system is rigged by the ruling party and
has imposed personal sanctions on Tibisay Lucena,
president of the National Electoral Council (CNE) “for
actively impulsing the elections of the National
Constituent Assembly, as well as collaborating in some
way to undermine democracy or human rights in
Venezuela,” as stated by a tweet on Dec. 6, 2018.</p>
<p>The U.S. government keeps sanctioning Venezuela public
servants, like the foreign commerce minister Alejandro
Fleming, who they blame for their “association with an
important driving force of corruption in Venezuela, the
black market surrounding the official regime on the
exchange rate.”</p>
<p>But the attacks are not only limited to words and
sanctions. On Wednesday, Maduro gave a press conference
on the municipal elections and accused John Bolton, U.S.
President Donald Trump’s national security advisor, of
plotting to kill him.</p>
<p>According to Maduro, there is a plan encouraged by
Bolton to train mercenary forces that will execute false
positives to military forces at the border with Colombia
in order to confuse public opinion and justify an attack
on Venezuela. Citing information by
Venezuela's Bolivarian Service for National Intelligence
(SEBIN), the joint effort is training 734 Colombian and
Venezuelan mercenaries for a paramilitary group called
G8.</p>
<p>In Dec. 7, 2018, the embassy commemorated “three months
since Juan Requesens was illegally jailed,” saying there
are “more political prisoners in civilian and military
prisons in Venezuela than days in a year.”</p>
<p>Requesens, an opposition legislator, was accused by the
SEBIN of participating in the <a
href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Venezuela-Opposition-Legislator-Linked-to-Drone-Attack-Detained-20180808-0005.html"
target="_blank">failed assassination attempt</a>
against Maduro in August.</p>
<p>Maduro also denounced the behavior of the embassy,
saying it “permanently makes declarations as if it was
another institution in Venezuela,” meddling with the
South American country’s internal affairs.</p>
<p>On Dec. 1, 2018, the embassy said the U.S. was “ready
to offer emergency assistance in food and medicines to
the Venezuelan people if only the government of Maduro
would accept it.” Even though the embassy declared the
sanctions allowed it, it didn’t talk about other
sanctions that block the country financially, hampering
efforts to export oil and introduce medicine and food
into the country by its own means.</p>
<p>Maduro also accused the Brazilian President-elect Jair
Bolsonaro of receiving orders from the U.S. to provoke
Venezuela militarily.</p>
<p>“Hamilton Mourao (the Vice-president elect of
Brazil)... everyday declares what that government’s
policy will be. Every day he says he will invade
Venezuela, that Brazil will use his military forces,” he
said.</p>
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