Panama reiterates that it is willing to give asylum to Maduro to solve the crisis
EFE (via 14ymedio), Douglas Marín, San José / Panama City, 9 August 2024 — Nicolás Maduro “leads a narco-state,” a “dictatorship,” and it is difficult for him to surrender power, the former president of Costa Rica and Nobel Peace Prize winner Óscar Arias declared this Friday . According to the politician, interviewed by EFE, what happened in Venezuela is something that does not surprise him. “Dictators don’t know how to get out of the presidential chair,” he stated.
The 1987 Nobelist said that the elections of July 28 were “a farce” in which Maduro “stole” the triumph. “The Venezuelan people deserve the Government to be handed over to the winner but, unfortunately, I am very skeptical. It is not easy for a narco-state, knowing that they are going to rot in a dungeon, to hand over power,” Arias said.
“Unfortunately, what is going to happen with six more years of Maduro is that those people, already miserable, suffering from hunger, are going to become more and more impoverished. It is impossible, given the chavista ideology, for that country to move forward, to consider foreign or domestic investment, to diversify the economy and end inflation,” he said.
Arias, who is 83, regretted that Mexico, Colombia and Brazil have not been emphatic when referring to the Venezuelan elections, although he clarified that it may be understandable if their intention is to be mediators. “I believed that Mexico, Colombia and Brazil were going to tell Maduro: ’your choice was a robbery, you stole the election of the Venezuelan people and disrespected the will of that people expressed at the polls, you committed a fraud that cannot be hidden’, but I was wrong, they didn’t do that. I understand that if their role is to mediate, they can’t be that blunt,” he said. continue reading
Arias stated that all the exit polls gave the opponent Edmundo González Urrutia as the winner, supported by the leader María Corina Machado, in a context in which there is “a very great discontent” with the Maduro Government and with chavismo in general. “The rulers of Venezuela (Hugo) Chávez and Maduro, have done a lot of damage. In Venezuela, killing a person is called homicide, but starving an entire people is called chavismo, and that’s what has happened. The best proof is that more than 7 million Venezuelans have left (emigrated),” he said.
Arias stated that all the exit polls showed the opponent Edmundo González Urrutia as the winner
The Government of Venezuela, for its part, continues to attack the Democratic United Platform (PUD) on several fronts, trying to discredit it. The Executive insisted again this Thursday in front of several ambassadors that the electoral records released by the opposition are false and intend to “ignore the results” of the presidential elections.
In addition, the Venezuelan Prosecutor’s Office has initiated criminal proceedings against the opposition leaders for disseminating, on its website, the results demonstrating that it was González Urrutia who won in the presidential elections.
The international community has also tried by various means to negotiate a way out for Maduro. In addition to the talks held with Venezuela by Colombia, Mexico and Brazil, and the guarantees offered by the United States, the president of Panama, José Raúl Mulino, reiterated this Friday that he would be willing to give political asylum to Maduro.
“If that is the quota of cooperation that Panama must make to get out of all this, offering our own country [as a place] for this man (Maduro) and his family to leave Venezuela, Panama would do it, without any doubt,” Mulino said in an interview with CNN, in which he maintained his position of offering Maduro asylum in order to facilitate the resolution of the crisis.
Nor did the president rule out the option of offering political asylum to other members of chavismo, if necessary. “In any way Panama can cooperate (it will). And if that is the quota of cooperation (extending asylum) that we have to do, I would do it,” added the Panamanian president, who has been a strong critic of the Venezuelan elections.
Mulino “transmitted” to the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, through the Foreign Ministry, Panama’s willingness “to be the bridge” to a third country
Mulino “transmitted” to the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, through the Foreign Ministry, Panama’s willingness “to be the bridge” to a third country, because, he added, he does not believe “that (Maduro) can stay in Panama,” since that “would be hard to sell to the population, but it is not the first time that Panama has helped in a crisis of this nature.”
Mulino pointed out several times during the interview that “this is not the first time that Panama has faced this type of problem with politicians on the run” and that “there have been other leaders who have landed here, with the idea of Panama contributing to a solution to internal political problems.”
The head of state recalled the cases of former Argentine president Juan Domingo Perón in 1956, Guatemalan Jorge Serrano Elías (1990-1993) and former Haitian coup general Raoul Cedrás (1991-1994), to whom the country granted asylum.
Panama was one of the countries that recognized Edmundo González as the president-elect of Venezuela, after considering the elections fraudulent. Both countries have suspended diplomatic relations and closed their airspace.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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