2023-04-20 22:23:32
“A strategy was raised on the table that is to hold elections first and then lift sanctions.” Or gradually move forward on both “rails”.
The president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, asked his US counterpart, Joe Biden, a strategy that consists of gradually lifting the sanctions against Venezuela as there is progress in electoral matters in that country.
“It was laid out on the table a strategy that is to hold elections first and then lift sanctions. Or gradually, to the extent that an electoral agenda is being fulfilled, that those sanctions are also lifted,” Petro said in statements to the press at the White House.
The Colombian leader appeared briefly before reporters after his meeting in the Oval Office of the White House with the US president and revealed that one of the topics of the meeting was the sanctions against Venezuelasomething to which the Colombian wanted to give priority.
Specifically, Petro proposed a “two rails” process, running in parallel.
two rails
One of those “rails” would be the lifting of the sanctions that the US has imposed on Venezuela and the other a schedule for elections with guarantees in Venezuelaas well as the return of that state to the Inter-American System of Human Rights.
Petro’s idea is that these two aspects are communicated and move in parallel until reaching a point where the Venezuelan people can “decide freely, without pressure and without sanctions, their own destiny.”
The Government of Joe Biden has been open to lifting sanctions to Venezuela, but only if concrete steps are taken for free and fair elections, the defense of human rights is strengthened and corruption is stopped.
Sanctions on Venezuela hardened under the government of Donald Trump (2017-2021) with economic restrictions against several Venezuelan officials, including the son of the country’s president, Nicolás “Nicolasito” Ernesto Maduro Guerra, and limits on the operations in the US of the company Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), the main source of foreign currency for Caracas.
Biden has upheld many of those sanctions. However, in November of last year, the US president authorized the oil company Chevron to resume its extraction operations in Venezuela on a limited basis.
Colombia will host next Tuesday an international conference on Venezuela in which sanctions will be part of the agenda and will also try to find ways to reactivate the dialogue between Chavismo and the opposition, which has been stalled since November.
Neither the opposition nor the government of Nicolás Maduro will participate in that conference, which will be attended by foreign ministers from some 20 countries, Petro said on Thursday.
The objective of this great meeting, affirmed the Colombian leader, will be “to establish the minimum a great deal that guarantees not only elections and the lifting of sanctions, but also the normality of all political actors in Venezuela”.
Source: EFE
PB
1682030444
#president #Colombia #asks #eliminate #sanctions #Venezuela #electoral #advances