Caracas:

Venezuela’s former presidential opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez has left for Spain in the wake of the South American country’s contested election, Venezuelan and Spanish officials said on Saturday night after a day of rising diplomatic tensions.

Gonzalez, 75, who ran against President Nicolas Maduro in July, left after “voluntarily seeking refuge in the Spanish embassy in Caracas several days ago,” Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez posted on Instagram.

“Edmundo Gonzalez has taken off from Caracas heading to Spain on a Spanish Air Force plane,” Spain’s Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares posted on X, saying Madrid was responding to a request from Gonzalez.

Gonzalez’s exit from Venezuela is the latest political development since the country’s election on July 28. Democracies around the world have criticized the Venezuelan government’s handling of the vote, which election officials and its top court say was won by Maduro.

Venezuela’s opposition say the election resulted in a resounding victory for Gonzalez, and published vote tallies online that they say show he won.

This week prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for Gonzalez in connection to the online publication of the tallies, accusing him of usurping functions, falsifying public documents and conspiracy, among other charges.

Earlier on Saturday, Venezuela’s government revoked Brazil’s authorization to represent Argentine interests in the country, including administering the embassy where six opposition figures are sheltering.

Venezuela broke relations with Argentina after the presidential election. Brazil, like Colombia and Mexico, has asked the Venezuelan government to publish the full results of the vote.

The government has not done so and the country’s electoral authority said Maduro won re-election for a third term.

In a statement, Venezuela said the decision, effective immediately, was due to proof that the embassy was being used to plan assassination attempts against Maduro and Rodriguez.

Brazil said it had received the communication that its authorization had been revoked “with surprise.” Argentina said it rejected the “unilateral” decision. Both countries urged Maduro to respect the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.

“Any attempt to invade or kidnap asylum seekers who remain in our official residence will be harshly condemned by the international community,” Argentina said in a statement. “Actions like these reinforce the conviction that in Maduro’s Venezuela, fundamental human rights are not respected.”

A Brazilian diplomatic source said on Saturday afternoon that Venezuela had assured Brazil it would not invade the embassy.

In its statement, Brazil insisted it would remain in custody and defense of Argentine interests until Argentina indicated another state acceptable to Venezuela to do so.

“The Brazilian government highlights in this context, under the terms of the Vienna Conventions, the inviolability of the facilities of the Argentine diplomatic mission,” it said, adding that it housed six Venezuelan asylum seekers, assets and archives.

The escalation in the spat between the South American countries was first reported by Reuters.

In March, six people sought asylum in the Argentine embassy in Caracas after a prosecutor ordered their arrest on charges including conspiracy. Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado has denied the allegations against her collaborators.

On Friday night, some opposition members in the Argentine residence reported on their X accounts that the building was under surveillance and had no electricity. They posted videos showing men dressed in black and patrols from the government intelligence agency, SEBIN.

Argentina’s Foreign Ministry asked the International Criminal Court on Friday to issue an arrest warrant against Maduro and other senior government officials for events that occurred after the elections.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro, who is seeking reelection for a third term, dances during the closing of his political campaign, in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 25, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Uncertainty hangs over presidential elections in Venezuela on July 28, with incumbent Nicolas Maduro vowing a “bloodbath” if he loses, which polls say is likely.

Seeking a third six-year term at the helm of the economically devastated country, Mr. Maduro lags behind challenger Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia in voter intention. However, the 61-year-old counts on loyal electoral machinery, military leadership and state institutions in a system of political patronage and, critics say, opposition repression.

Mr. Maduro said July 25 that he, and he alone, can “guarantee peace and stability” for Venezuela, having warned recently of a “bloodbath” if he loses to an opposition he has sought to paint as “fascists.”

Analysts have told AFP that violence is likely if the state apparatus intervenes in an election that the opposition is all but certain of winning. Mr. Gonzalez Urrutia, for his part, urged Venezuelans not let “the message of hate… intimidate you.”

Mr. Gonzalez Urrutia, a 74-year-old former diplomat, is running in the place of wildly popular opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who was barred from the presidential race by institutions loyal to Mr. Maduro on what she and others say are trumped-up corruption charges.

Last week, the Venezuelan rights group Foro Penal reported 102 arrests this year of people linked to the opposition campaign, adding to more than 270 “political prisoners” in the country. U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said July 25 that Washington hoped for “peaceful elections” and stressed that “any political repression and violence is unacceptable.”

The United States, which has sanctions in place against the Maduro government, is keen for a return to stability in oil-rich Venezuela, whose economic collapse has prompted many migrants to head to the southern U.S. border.

Rights watchdog Human Rights Watch said the U.S., European Union, and influential neighbours Brazil and Colombia should use every diplomatic tool to protect the integrity of the vote.

“While the election in Venezuela will hardly be free or fair, Venezuelans have their best chance in over a decade to elect their government, and the international community should have their back as they do,” said HRW Americas director Juanita Goebertus.

Venezuela’s failed economy

The government in Caracas accuses the opposition of conspiring against Mr. Maduro, whose 2018 re-election was rejected as illegitimate by most Western and Latin American countries.

Years of tough sanctions and other pressure have failed to dislodge the president, who enjoys support from a political patronage system and the nation’s military leaders, as well as from Cuba, Russia and China.

Mr. Maduro has repeatedly vowed that he won’t cede power now even as Venezuelans clamour for change.

The formerly rich petro-state has seen GDP fall by 80% in less than a decade, driving some seven million of its citizens to flee. Most Venezuelans live on just a few dollars a month, with the health care and education systems in total disrepair and biting shortages of electricity and fuel.

The government blames U.S. sanctions for the state of affairs, however, observers say the collapse of the country’s all-important oil industry was mainly the result of deep-rooted corruption and mismanagement.

U.S. oil sanctions were briefly eased after Mr. Maduro agreed in negotiations with the opposition to hold free and fair elections this year. They were tightened after he reneged on the conditions, though Washington is allowing companies to apply for individual licenses to keep operating in Venezuela.

‘If you lose, you go’

The election poses the biggest threat yet to 25 years of “Chavismo,” the populist movement founded by Mr. Maduro’s predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chavez.

Voter Mercedes Henriques, 68, told AFP at an opposition rally she was excited for change “because we cannot anymore with this dictatorship we have.” But her optimism was tainted by worry. “We are praying that they don’t steal the election,” she said.

Analysts told AFP the Mr. Maduro is unlikely to concede defeat, especially in the absence of any immunity guarantees. The Venezuelan government is under investigation for human rights abuses by the International Criminal Court.

Some 21 million Venezuelans are eligible to cast a vote on Sunday.

Caracas has withdrawn an invitation to European Union experts to observe the vote, while allowing monitors from the U.N. and the U.S.-based Carter Center.

Argentina’s former president Alberto Fernandez on July 24 said that Caracas had also withdrawn an invitation for him to observe the polling. This came after he echoed a statement by Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who had said: “Maduro has to learn: if you win, you stay. If you lose, you go.”