Friday 9 May 2014

More repression in Venezuela


Yesterday seven more people were detained in the working class neighbourhood of La Isabelica, in Valencia. They are accused of organising protests there.

As others reported earlier, the Venezuelan regime detained 243 young people in Caracas, of which 18 were underage. They were rounded up and put in jail for holding protest camps in the city. The former coup monger and current minister of Interior said the National Guard had found drugs, guns and even mortars...he could have said students also had a couple of planes and tanks hiding inside their tents.

As many people report me, the officers in charge of the Guardia Nacional forces are giving speeches to their subordinates about how those who protest are "traitors of the fatherland", scum, people who want to destroy their way of living. It is no surprise Human Rights Watch has produced such a report about Venezuela.

The hearing of opposition leader Leopoldo López has been postponed again..just like that. It is incredible López is still in prison, but then that's the way the military and Cubans have to rule in Venezuela.

The US under secretary Roberta Jackobson really screwed it up when she said the Mesa de la Unidad told the US government not to hang sanctions against the regime. The opposition representative Aveledo said that wasn't true, but he wasn't clear about what the Mesa de la Unidad wants either.

The opposition should stop carrying out any discussion with the government behind closed doors. A government that is fundamentally against any pluralism will always use the process to pretend it is open to dialogue when in reality it is not.

If there is a meeting, as foreigners expect, it has always to be as a live debate where one public channel broadcasts everything to all Venezuelans. People who used violence to get to power even if Venezuela had elections, who murdered people to reach their goals as Chavistas did, can only be dealt with in a transparent way in front of everyone. Never trust them. Behind closed-door meetings are perhaps fine for discussing details of government formation in Switzerland or the Netherlands but not when dealing with former coup mongers who have a lot to lose if they ever relinquish power.

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