Macron confers with Venezuelan opposition

‘RELIEVE THE CRISIS’

PARIS • French President Emmanuel Macron met with Venezuela opposition leaders Monday to discuss the embattled nation’s humanitarian and political crisis, two days after a leading activist was barred from leaving the country in order to attend the Paris meeting.

Foreign nations including Spain and the United Kingdom, whose leaders are expected to meet with members of Venezuela’s oppositioncontrolled National Assembly this week, have decried the socialist government’s move to bar Lilian Tintori from leaving Venezuela.

In Caracas, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza said Monday that he filed complaints with the ambassadors of four foreign nations for purportedly intervening in Venezuela’s affairs after they accompanied Tintori to the airport.

“These types of expressions are absurd and offensive to the functioning of Venezuelan democracy and its institutions,” Arreaza said.

Julio Borges, president of the National Assembly, and Freddy Guevara, the legislature’s first vice-president, are proceeding with meetings scheduled this week with European leaders aimed at increasing international pressure on President Nicolas Maduro to hold elections, respect a balance of power and allow humanitarian aid.

Borges and Guevara told Macron that Venezuelans are in dire need of basic necessities like food and medicine at the same time that Maduro’s government is stripping away basic civil rights. Borges said Macron asked “several times what he could do to relieve the crisis” and offered the possibility of providing humanitarian aid.

That’s a prospect that Maduro is likely to reject. The Venezuelan leader has routinely refused to accept any foreign assistance, denying the nation is facing a crisis.

“Dozens of countries have offered free food and medicine and it’s unbelievable that the main obstacle is (the) government, the one which is supposed to defend the rights of the Venezuelan people,” Borges said.

Tintori, a prominent opposition activist, was scheduled to attend the meeting with Macron but Venezuelan immigration authorities seized her passport Saturday as she prepared to board her flight. No official explanation has been given for why Tintori was barred from travelling, but it came a day after she was ordered to appear before a judge to answer questions about a large sum of cash found in her vehicle.

Those who did make the trip are also scheduled to meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister Theresa May and Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.