‘Sham’ election win prompts US sanctions on ‘dictator’ Maduro
THE United States last night branded Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela’s president, a “dictator” on a par with Syria’s Bashar al-assad or North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, and imposed sanctions on him after Sunday’s controversial vote on the constitution.
The international community rounded on Mr Maduro and condemned polling day violence in which up to 15 people were killed.
Mr Maduro hailed the vote as a “sublime” victory for the Venezuelan people, as the government-allied electoral council said more than eight million people had cast ballots nationwide to give the president increased powers.
The opposition dismissed that figure as fabricated, pointing to reports of empty polling stations and citing anonymous government sources as putting the figure at just under 2.5million.
Washington has long been a critic of Mr Maduro – and of his late predecessor, Hugo Chavez – but yesterday’s statement marks the first time that senior officials have publicly branded him a dictator. The US has already imposed sanctions on several Venezuelan individuals and organisations, but, in taking the rare step of targeting a sitting head of state by name, it signalled growing alarm at the crisis.
“Yesterday’s illegitimate elections confirm that Maduro is a dictator who disregards the will of the Venezuelan people,” said Steven Mnuchin, the US treasury secretary.
Mr Mnuchin said Mr Maduro was only the fourth foreign leader to be blacklisted in this way. HR Mcmaster, the national security adviser, warned he had joined an “exclusive club” led by Assad, Kim and Robert Mugabe, president of Zimbabwe.
In a statement, Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary said: “Venezuela stands on the brink of disaster and Nicolas Maduro’s government must stop before it is too late. The country is turning on itself – more than 100 have died already – and democracy and basic rights are in jeopardy.” Across Latin America, governments refused to rec- ognise the result of the vote, which Mr Maduro has said will herald a “new era of combat” for Venezuela’s revolution. He insisted that the election had been a “sublime demonstration of bravery and the sovereignty of the fatherland”.
The new Constituent Assembly is ostensibly aimed at resolving the political conflict that has consumed Venezuela since the opposition won control of the National Assembly in 2015.
Mr Maduro has since then been locked in a stand-off with the assembly, which he accuses of acting illegally to sabotage his agenda. Rewriting the constitution will, he insists, enable him to restore stability to the country, which has been wracked by deadly protests since April. But critics say the move is a power grab that will lead to a Cuban-style congress serving only to rubber stamp government policy.
Election day was marred by serious violence, with clashes between protesters, security forces and government-linked armed groups across the country. The opposition reported that 15 people had been killed and almost 100 detained. In Caracas, an explosion apparently caused by an improvised explosive device hit a National Guard motorcycle convoy, injuring several soldiers, in what appeared to signal a new tactical stage for more radical elements of the self-styled “resistance”.
There were fears that the vote would unleash deeper violence, with Mr Maduro having banned protests and announced the jailing of opposition “terrorists” as the first task of the constituent assembly.
Freddy Guevera, vice-president of the National Assembly, described the vote as “a tragedy”, saying it would only mean “more crisis” for Venezuela.