El País reports that
The Vatican confirmed in a letter sent in August it was prepared to help facilitate dialogue between Venezuela’s ruling party and forces opposed to the presidency of Nicolás Maduro.
While the opposition says that
“We are prepared to talk with anyone as long as the time frames for a referendum on a change of president in Venezuela are respected,”
the fact remains that any “talks” will favor the regime, since it buys it time.
Once the Vatican-approved “talks” (much like the Cuba-U.S. easement, and the FARC-Colombian government negotiations) start, the opposition would be pretty much coerced into continuing “talking”, regardless of the referendum time frame.
The problem is, the country is in a crisis such that only further oppression will continue the regime. For instance, today the WaPo reports that In a hungry Venezuela, buying too much food can get you arrested, and you can’t even camp outside the stores, even if you dared risk being mugged while you wait,
According to the Caracas-based rights group Provea, national guard troops have periodically carried out a mass-arrest operation nicknamed “Dracula’s Bus” to round up Venezuelans trying to wait in line overnight for groceries, now a banned practice. More than 1,000 people were loaded onto buses in such sweeps last year and accused of being black marketeers, Provea researcher Intis Rodríguez said.
Not that you could afford much; A Dozen Eggs Cost $150 As Hyperinflation Horrors Hit Socialist Utopia.
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay agreed late Tuesday to give the Venezuelan government a Dec. 1 deadline to meet Mercosur’s rules to qualify for the post. Meanwhile, the presidency will be filled by an interim team from the other member states, the four countries said in a statement.
Don’t miss Joel Hirst’s excellent report, As Venezuela Goes ‘Rouge’
Venezuela’s government is becoming increasingly Khmer ‘Rouge’. Not Castro-Communist, the oppressive weight of the old bearded godfather stifling any dreaming, thinking, reading; any activity, economic and other. A protracted standstill, a nation sitting on the curb, aging. Boredom – with intermittent bouts of starvation, sporadic violence only. But nothing for the newspapers, right? Not Stalinist either – a massive organized purge amid exalted acts of national defiance; exceptional universities and great gulags; majestic theaters and prodigious prisons – astronauts and athletes, philosophers and physicists – and slaughter. Nor is it really Maoist – the planners’ great leaps forward into starvation. These were the dreams of Hugo Chavez’s Bolivarianism.
No, Nick Maduro’s Venezuela is decidedly ‘Rouge’ – the glorification of ignorance, stupidity; a warden-government turning the lights out on a civilization.
Cross-posted at WoW! Magazine.
Mr. Hirst hit the nail on the head. There is a LOT of death coming to Venezuela because of this Castrista insanity. The whole world needs to be pressuring Maduro to respect democracy instead of blindly protecting leftist regimes over ideological loyalties (remember the leftist love for Idi Amin?) The USA should quit buying Venezuelan oil until humanitarian aid is accepted by the chavista idiots who are denying that there is even a problem. There is a total breakdown of law and order at this point and Venezuela is turning into Somalia while the left denies its failures and blames everyone but themselves. They have stolen so much money that they know they will be prosecuted if the regime falls. And the rich idiots of Hollywood are silent.
I really am trying to understand his Holiness’s reasoning. I had thought that he thought hunger was something that had to be dealt with asap, that poverty was to be relieved. And yet, the talks that the Vatican is sponsoring will, in all probability, extend hunger and poverty in Venezuela. Am I missing something?
the talks that the Vatican is sponsoring will, in all probability, extend hunger and poverty in Venezuela
I don’t understand Francis’s reasoning – at all.
They’re silent now.
Back in the day they were taking money from Chávez, especially Danny Glover.