The former Argentine president says that Caracas has a copy of the allegedly hacked results
EFE/14ymedio, Mexico City/Santiago de Chile/Caracas/ 4 August 2024 — The former president of Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, joined the call made by different Latin American presidents on Saturday for the electoral authorities of Venezuela to publish the voting records of the July 28 elections, which showed President Nicolás Maduro’s defeat at the hands of Edmundo González Urrutia. Just as the opposition has already done
From Mexico, where she traveled to participate in a forum organized by the ruling party, Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional (Morena), Fernández de Kirchner urged the National Electoral Council (CNE) to publish the results, “not only for the Venezuelan people, the opposition and democracy,” but also “for the legacy of Hugo Chávez himself.”
“That’s what we have to ask for: that the records be published so that everyone can scrutinize them – international public opinion, the opposition and the people of Venezuela,” Fernández de Kirchner said.
The former Argentine president also affirmed she “fully” shared in the statement signed last Thursday by the Governments of Brazil, Mexico and Colombia, where they called on the Venezuelan authorities to publish in an “expeditious way” the data “disaggregated by polling station” of the elections held a week ago in the South American country.
“That’s what we have to ask for: that the results be published so that everyone can scrutinize them, international public opinion, the opposition, the people of Venezuela”
After this Saturday’s demonstrations in Caracas, led by María Corina Machado, Fernández de Kichner said she was “happy” because Machado had come out of “clandestinity,” where she was for security reasons, after Maduro threatened to put the leaders of the opposition in jail.
The former president (2007-2015) and former vice president (2019-2023) of Argentina traveled to Mexico on Friday night and is expected to meet with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and his successor, the president-elect, Claudia Sheinbaum.
Meanwhile, the president of Chile, Gabriel Boric, said on Saturday that he maintains his position on the outcome of the presidential elections in Venezuela and will not validate “any result that is not verified by independent international organizations.”
Boric insisted on not recognizing the triumph of Chavismo after meeting at the La Moneda Palace with his ambassador to Venezuela, Jaime Gazmuri, recently expelled by Maduro, after the Chilean government rejected the results that declared Maduro the winner of the elections that would perpetuate him in power until 2031.
“We call for full respect for the human rights of protesters in Venezuela and an end to arbitrary arrests and violence,” Boric added from his X account, while calling Venezuela’s expulsion of the Chilean diplomat “untimely and unjustified.”
“We call for full respect for the human rights of protesters in Venezuela and to end arbitrary arrests and violence”
Yesterday, not only were there demonstrations inside Venezuela, but the diaspora of Venezuelans living in exile also took to the streets in various countries in Latin America, the United States and Spain to denounce the fraud in last Sunday’s elections.
In the United States, where there are about 750,000 Venezuelans, 60% of whom are in South Florida according to official data, calls for support of the opposition have multiplied in several cities, including Miami and New York. Similar demonstrations were held in Ecuador, Mexico, El Salvador, Peru, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Honduras, Panama, Argentina and Colombia.
A rally called by the Venezuelan opposition in Spain on Saturday in Madrid asked that international pressure not cease until Maduro recognizes that the winner of the elections is González Urrutia.
The crowd gathered at the Puerta del Sol with Venezuelan flags and numerous placards with messages such as: “We cannot ignore so many people who ask for a change,” “Nobody said it would be easy,” “Freedom for all political prisoners,” “The fight is not over,” “SOS, intervention now,” “Many of us want to return home,” “No more repression, no more deaths,” “Maduro lost, we have the results,” “Edmundo president with an overwhelming majority” and “Fraud.”
Antonio Ledezma, a former mayor of Caracas, in statements to EFE, said that “mercenaries” were sent from Nicaragua and Cuba support “the repression” of the Venezuelan Government “against its people.”
Maduro announced this Saturday that 2,000 people have been arrested in Venezuela after participating in the protests against electoral fraud
Ledezma, exiled in Madrid, questioned if the international community “will allow an innocent, peaceful people, who accepted the challenge of going to the elections, to be massacred by a dictator like Maduro.” At the same time, he urged leaders like López Obrador to bluntly condemn the electoral “fraud” in Venezuela, as other Latin American leaders have done.
Maduro announced this Saturday that 2,000 people have been arrested in Venezuela after participating in the protests against electoral fraud. “We have 2,000 prisoners captured and from there they go to (the prisons) Tocorón and Tocuyito, maximum punishment, justice. This time there will be no forgiveness, this time what there will be is Tocorón,” the president said in front of supporters who marched this Saturday in Caracas, in parallel with the protest called by Machado and González Urrutia.
The Venezuelan president accused the detained opposition protesters of allegedly burning polling stations, as well as regional headquarters of the CNE. So, he maintained, what they did was “very serious,” and he threatened that there will be “complete justice” after “everyone confesses, because there has been a strict legal process, directed by the Attorney General’s Office, with full guarantees when everyone is convicted and confesses.”
Translated by Regina Anavy
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