The Chavista government and the Venezuelan opposition met on Tuesday May 17 with the aim of “find the spirit” of the negotiation process they were leading in Mexico, suspended in October, after the announcement by Washington of a slight easing of sanctions against the government. The heads of the two delegations, Jorge Rodríguez, representative of President Nicolás Maduro, and opposition leader Gerardo Blyde wrote the same message on their Twitter accounts: “In a working meeting for future plans. To resuscitate the spirit of Mexico”along with a photo of them shaking hands.
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The political dialogue process received a boost on Tuesday from the United States, which announced a partial lifting of the battery of sanctions with which it riddled the Maduro government, following his re-election in 2018 which it considers fraudulent. This “penalty relief” primarily concerns a “limited exemption” granted to the American oil group Chevron as part of the embargo on Venezuelan crude in place since 2019, and “another measure” which will be announced later by the Treasury, according to a US official. “Venezuela aspires that these decisions of the United States pave the way for the absolute lifting of the illicit sanctions that affect all our people”reacted the vice-president Delcy Rodriguez.
This measure was taken “at the request of the Venezuelan transitional government” opponent Juan Guaido, recognized by the United States as the legitimate president of Venezuela, according to a source at the White House. “We insist on the urgency of immediately relaunching the mechanism of Mexico in favor of Venezuelans”wrote Juan Guaidó, ratifying the request of the opposition in favor of“free and fair presidential and parliamentary elections”. For the moment, no date has been set for the resumption of these talks.
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Nicolás Maduro announced in March a reactivation “with great strength” of the dialogue process, after receiving a delegation from the American government in Caracas, at a time when Washington was seeking to isolate Russia from its allies following the invasion of Ukraine. The dialogue was interrupted in October 2021 in retaliation for the extradition to the United States of Alex Saab, a Colombian businessman accused of being the president’s figurehead.