Washington’s recognition of
the shadow government headed by Venezuelan National Assembly president Juan
Guaidó is one more demonstration of how the Trump administration has
radicalized foreign policy positions and in doing so violates international
law, including the charter of the Organization of American
States.
On this issue like others, the Obama
administration laid the groundwork for Trump’s radicalization, but it was
usually more discrete. Obama issued an executive order calling Venezuela a
threat to U.S. national security and created a list of Venezuelan officials who
were sanctioned.
The Trump administration’s
escalation included financial sanctions against the Venezuelan government and
measures against the nation’s oil industry, prohibiting the Venezuelan
majority-owned refinery, CITGO, from sending profits back to Venezuela. Until
then the Venezuelan government had been receiving one billion dollars a year
from CITGO.
The Trump administration is now threatening a total oil embargo on
Venezuela and is leaving the “military option” open.
Throughout Region
In addition, top administration
officials have played an openly activist role by traveling throughout the
continent to promote the campaign to isolate Venezuela.
The first signal that the pro-U.S.
international community would recognize the Guaidó government came from
Washington along with its most right-wing ally, the Jair Bolsonaro government
of Brazil. As of last year, Great Britain had intended to not recognize
President Nicolás Maduro after he took office for his second term on
January 10, but it intended to maintain diplomatic relations. Washington pushed
for a more radical position, that of not only not recognizing Maduro but
establishing diplomatic relations with a shadow government.
The activist approach to diplomacy
was put in evidence the day after the January 23 opposition protests, when U.S.
Secretary of State Pompeo offered $20 million of “humanitarian assistance” to
the Venezuelan population. Many Venezuelans see this as humiliating and nothing
short of a bribe designed to pressure the country into submission.
Further Polarization
Ellner
spoke Friday morning about Venezuela on Democracy Now!
N0t since the Cuban revolution, has
the U.S. government played such an overtly activist role throughout the
continent in favor of the isolation of a government that is not to its liking.
In the process it has further polarized Venezuela and the continent as a whole.
The moderates in the Venezuelan opposition, including two former presidential
candidates of the two main traditional parties, Claudio Fermín and Eduardo
Fernández, have favored electoral participation and recognition of the
legitimacy of the Maduro government. Washington’s actions pull the rug from
under the moderates and strengthen the hands of the extremists in the
opposition.
Opposition parties have contradicted
themselves, first accepting in August 2017 a National Constituent Assembly’s
(ANC) call for gubernatorial elections in October of that year and then
refusing to participate in the May 2018 presidential elections, also called by
the Assembly, on the grounds that the Assembly itself was illegitimate. Hence
most of those same parties refuse to recognize the Maduro government.
The Trump administration has
promoted a similar radicalization throughout the hemisphere. Most of the
countries that have recognized Guaidó are on the right (as opposed to the
center). But previously, the rightist presidents of Chile (Sebasián Piñera),
Argentina (Mauricio Macri) and Brazil (under then president Michel Temer)
rejected the Sept. 2018 statement by OAS secretary general Luis Almagro that
military intervention in Venezuela should be considered. Trump, Bolsonaro and
recently elected Colombian president Iván Duque have pushed these rightist
presidents to an even more extreme position on Venezuela.
But just as there are moderates in
the Venezuelan opposition who support dialogue, which the mainstream media have
pretty much ignored, there are moderates in the international community who are
also in favor of dialogue. These figures include Mexican president Andrés
Manuel López Obrador, Pope Francis, UN secretary general Antonio Guterres, and
the UN’sHigh Commissioner for Human Rights and ex-president of Chile Michelle
Bachelet. What they are proposing represents the best hope for this battered
nation.
Steve Ellner is associate managing
editor of “Latin American Perspectives” and is the editor of “The Pink Tide
Experiences: Breakthroughs and Shortcomings in Twenty-First Century Latin
America” (2019).
