Venezuela

On the Trump administration’s decision to work with Delcy Rodríguez

Forcing Maduro out: “We made multiple attempts to get Maduro to leave voluntarily and to avoid all of this. Because we understood that he was an impediment to progress. You couldn’t make a deal with this guy.”

The first goal wasn’t a rushed attempt at a democratic transition or vote: “You can have elections all day. But if the opposition has no access to the media, if opposition candidates are routinely dismissed and unable to be on the ballot because of the government, then those aren’t free and fair elections. That’s the endstate that we want. Free, fair, prosperous and friendly Venezuela. We are not gonna get there in three weeks. It’s going to take some time. So objective number one was stability.”

Not a quick, straightforward process: “For the first time in over a decade and a half there’s a real possibility of transformation. And a lot of it will depend on them. There are many people living in Florida and across the country who would like to go back and be a part of Venezuela’s economic life. Many of them are eager to do so. And Venezuela is going to need them to go back and rebuild the businesses that were taken (…) This is not a frozen dinner that you put  in a microwave and two and a half minutes later it comes out ready to eat. These are complex things. We’ve seen this play out. I use the example of Paraguay and Spain, there are others. When there’s a transition from autocracy to democracy, it’s not linear.”

Rubio didn’t want to get involved in the issue of an investigation into Delcy by US prosecutors. She wasn’t arrested because she hasn’t been indicted like Maduro, and they work with her because those who control the weapons and the institutions are regime figures. The US managed to avoid war, millions of people were prevented from fleeing to Colombia, by establishing communication with key regime actors.

To critics of US policy in Venezuela, Rubio put it this way: “You told us you didn’t want any more regime change, and now you criticize us for not changing the regime.” 

Rubio said he doesn’t want chavismo to entrench. According to him, the US goal is not to leave  “people from this system” in power (who he claims not to trust), but right now it’s necessary to preserve a level of respect and communication maintained so far (since the January 3 military intervention).

On Venezuelan oil

The Secretary of State insisted that the chavista regime was sustained by corruption, something that is no longer sustainable, and that oil money “will not go to the drug cartels.” 

Funds from the oil sales will go into a Venezuela-owned account in Qatar that the US will be able to supervise:  “They needed money quickly to fund the police officers, the sanitation workers, the daily operations of government. So we’ve been able to create a short-term mechanism. This is not gonna be the permanent mechanism, but this is a mechanism in which the needs of the Venezuelan people can be met through a process that we’ve created where they will submit every month a budget of what needs to be funded. We will provide for them at the front end what that money cannot be used for. And they’ve been very cooperative in this regard. In fact, they have pledged to use a substantial amount of those funds to purchase medicine and equipment directly from the US.”

Rubio also said another $300 million might come in, but Delcy & Co. first must allow an audit of the initial funds to ensure they are being used appropriately.

On the other hand, China can buy Venezuelan oil, but at market price. No Maduro-era discounts set as a result of US sanctions. The Secretary of State said the US wants to lift said sanctions to boost economic activity, but he doesn’t expect the recovery to involve US spending.

Rubio celebrated the amendment process of the Hydrocarbons Law, which basically eliminates many of the restrictions on foreign investment in the oil industry. It doesn’t go far enough to attract more investment, but it’s a big step compared to where things were three weeks ago.”

He suggested that companies would invest in Venezuela knowing their money is safe and their assets wouldn’t be taken away. The goal is to create the conditions for a normal, stable and transparent business environment in Venezuela. Their heavy crude isn’t unique, Canada has it too: “It’s not irreplaceable. But we understand that that is the lifeline and their natural resources will allow Venezuela to be stable and prosperous moving forward. what we hope to do is transition to a mechanism that allows that to be sold in a normal way, a normal oil industry, not one dominated by cronies, graft and corruption.”

Threats to the Rodríguez regime

Rubio expressed the regime’s performance is being assessed based on actions, not discourse. Stopping Venezuela from being the backyard of China, Russia and Iran would be a huge step.

“For the first time in 20 years, we are having serious conversations about eroding and eliminating the Iranian presence, the Chinese influence, the Russian presence as well. In fact, I will tell you that there are many elements there in Venezuela that welcome a return to establishing relations with the United States on multiple fronts,” Rubio said.

He acknowledged that political prisoners are being released, though not at the pace he desires, and that US officials would be mindful of how opposition leaders coming out from hiding would be treated (Delsa Solórzano being the last example).

Rubio said the US is generally pleased with how things have evolved in the past three weeks, but “we’ll let them know” if that changes. He does not anticipate any further military action in Venezuela in the short term. He claimed the use of force would depend on the stabilization goals being met, not on helping those goals.

“The only military presence you will see in Venezuela is our Marine guards at an embassy. That is our goal, that is our expectation, and that is what everything that outlines towards. That said, if an Iranian drone factory pops up and threatens our forces in the region, the president retains the option to eliminate that threat.”

On the future

Rubio was reluctant to provide a precise timeline for the current arrangement between Venezuelan authorities and the US. The Trump administration wants to see rapid progress, he suggested. And in five months, the situation must be different to what they currently see.

In the long term, the US wants Venezuela to have a democratically-elected government. But that stage wouldn’t be achieved in a matter of weeks (see quote in sub-section one). Rubio said he wants María Corina to be part of the transition and to be able to participate in an election at some point. He acknowledged they’ve known each other for the past 12 years, and both him and Trump respect the opposition leader.

Finally, Rubio explicitly labeled the Venezuelan opposition as diverse. He said that both opposition figures like Maria Corina who never supported chavismo and chavistas that disliked Maduro (which he called people “committed to chavista ideology) should have representation, and that internal reconciliation would allow those sectors to participate in national politics. The ultimate goal is legitimate democratic elections, and whatever happens, Rubio hopes the next Venezuelan leaders will have cordial relations with the US.

Plane vanished in remote jungle near eastern border with Venezuela; search hindered by dense terrain and adverse weather.

Bogota, Colombia – Search and rescue teams in Colombia are searching for a passenger plane carrying 15 passengers that went missing near the eastern border with Venezuela.

Two crew members were among the passengers, which included a Colombian congressional representative and a candidate running in the upcoming elections, according to local officials and media reports.

It remains unclear what caused the disappearance, but local Air Traffic Control sources say the plane’s flight history shows a sudden altitude drop 11 minutes before it was expected to land in Ocana.

The flight, operated by government-run commercial airline Satena, was en route from Cucuta to Ocana, two cities in the North Santander department bordering Venezuela, when it left radar coverage.

“The Accident Investigation Directorate of @AerocivilCol reports that it is gathering information regarding the loss of communication from aircraft HK4709, which was flying the Cucuta-Ocaña route with 13 passengers and 2 crew members,” wrote Maria Fernanda Rojas, Colombia’s minister of transport, in a post on X.

“The corresponding protocols have been activated, and we have already initiated PMU,” added Rojas, referring to the “Unified Command Post” set up to respond to emergencies.

The plane disappeared in a remote region characterised by dense jungle, complicating search-and-rescue efforts.

Among the passengers was Diogenes Quintero, a lower house lawmaker who holds a seat specially reserved for conflict victims. He was accompanied by ​​Carlos Salcedo Salazar, a candidate running for the same seat.

A local government official, who requested anonymity since they were not authorised to speak to the press, told Al Jazeera that authorities suspected that the plane had been affected by adverse weather conditions.

Drug trade

The Catatumbo region is also an active conflict zone and is home to the world’s largest cultivations of coca, the plant which produces the raw ingredient used to make cocaine.

Both the drug trade and the region’s strategic location on the Venezuelan border have made it a historic hotbed for armed conflict between rebel groups.

In January last year, violent clashes between the National Liberation Army (ELN) and Frente 33, a dissident group of the demobilised FARC fighters, displaced more than 50,000 people in the region.

The route from Cucuta to Ocana began operating only in June last year, marking an important milestone for a region that has historically had poor road connections to major cities.

In recent days, the Venezuelan public debate has been filled with comparisons between what has transpired after the January 3 US military operation and the era of Juan Vicente Gómez (1908–1935), the Andean strongman who ruled for 27 years. The immediate flashpoint is the National Assembly’s proposed reform of the 2006 Hydrocarbons Law, designed to reopen the oil industry to private capital. 

Displaced chavistas such as Andrés Izarra argue the reform is unconstitutional and evokes the “servile” terms under which Gómez granted oil concessions to foreign firms in the 1920s. Yet the comparison extends beyond oil: chavismo’s political economy resembles Gómez’s in three recurring ways: monopoly rents, opaque bargains with capital, and repression that doubles as a system of extraction.

Scholars of early twentieth-century Venezuela have shown that corruption and the privatization of public office of the Gómez era functioned as governing tools that helped finance coercion, reward loyalists, and develop a powerful and centralized state. Gómez assembled a ruling coalition by binding regional powerbrokers and emerging civilian interests to state-sanctioned rents, especially through monopolies granted under the dictator’s shadow. The arrangement remains familiar to Venezuelans who have watched chavismo merge political loyalty, access to state resources, and personal enrichment into a single logic of rule. Those mechanisms are easiest to see in the political economy of monopoly, contracts, and prisons.

Public office as private business

First, monopoly rents have flourished under authoritarian rule. Under Hugo Chávez, the progressive erosion of checks and balances, and the hollowing out of democratic constraints, helped reconstitute a patrimonial logic of governance. Discretionary access to state resources became a core currency of political loyalty. Over time, the government entrusted senior military officers with the “management” of strategic sectors and state enterprises, creating incentives in which institutional loyalty and personal stake became difficult to disentangle. Alongside these appointments, the state’s dense architecture of controls and bureaucratic choke points created new opportunities to extract rents, shifting costs onto ordinary Venezuelans while protecting insiders. A similar political logic constructed power in Venezuela more than a century ago.

Gómez consolidated his ruling coalition through a tacit understanding: public office could be treated as private business, so long as loyalty held and order endured. One reliable stream of income that lubricated those clientelistic networks came from the cattle business. Beginning early in the regime, the autocrat and his circle leveraged control over cattle supply and slaughtering channels, backed by selective taxation and regulatory privilege, to squeeze competitors and reward allies. Another, more explicitly fiscal mechanism, was tax farming. The state granted private individuals the right to collect specific federal taxes, liquor being a prominent case, in exchange for a fixed payment to the treasury, leaving the tax farmer free to pocket the surplus. Many of the habits we now associate with the petrostate were already baked into everyday monopolies on beef and booze. Oil did not invent rent-seeking; it amplified it, turning familiar practices of privileged access into vastly more lucrative rents.

Delcy’s CPPs transfer operational and investment burdens to private actors, while the state retains political control. These deals have created a new class of intermediaries whose profitability depends less on technical competence than on privileged access to decision-makers.

If the military profited from monopolies in agriculture and cattle ranching, oil gave Gómez a broader instrument: it allowed him to co-opt civilian elites who had long bristled at Andean hegemony. Beyond the autocrat’s immediate family, the most visible beneficiaries of the concession trade were lawyers, engineers, bankers, and other members of the professional classes who monetized access, paperwork, and proximity to power in the new petroleum economy.

A comparable dynamic has surfaced amid PDVSA’s collapse. As the government ignored the current hydrocarbons framework, “productive participation contracts” (CPPs) emerged as a salient workaround. These arrangements effectively transfer operational and investment burdens to private actors, while the state retains political control. Investigative outlets have traced how these opaque deals created a new class of intermediaries whose profitability depends less on technical competence than on privileged access to decision-makers. The Anti-Blockade Law, in turn, has provided the legal umbrella for confidentiality, shielding contract terms from public scrutiny in the name of national security and sanctions evasion. 

This pattern is not an accidental echo of the 1920s concession era: the bargain with foreign capital then was not merely economic, but political and deliberately opaque. And when monopolies and privileged access harden into a system, those who cannot buy their way around it are left to absorb the costs; those who challenge it often face a harsher penalty than economic hardship, imprisonment. 

Extractivist fear

La Rotunda became a landmark of political oppression under Gómez. In its cells, political prisoners endured systematic torture and humiliation, and the regime’s agents turned captivity into a market through constant extortion for money, food, and favors. Many detainees suffered forced labor so that the infrastructure they built (roads and highways), and that the dictatorship showcased as “modernization,” often bore the hidden imprint of coerced bodies. 

That same logic is painfully recognizable today for families with relatives held at El Helicoide and other detention centers. Relatives bring medicines, food, and basic supplies only to face a system in which guards and intermediaries can confiscate, withhold, or demand payments simply to deliver necessities, or even to confirm that a detainee is still there. Imprisonment becomes not only repression, but another revenue stream: a mechanism of extraction layered onto fear.

If the Gómez precedent teaches anything, it is that once an authoritarian equilibrium is broken, restoring the old order is far harder than improvising a new one.

These parallels go a long way toward explaining why both systems proved so resilient, able to ride out internal shocks by combining repression with co-optation, and by making access to rents the glue of elite cohesion. Important differences remain, however. 

The dawn versus the sunset of democracy

Gómez ruled over a country still shaped by civil war legacies and weak national institutions. Part of his historical significance lies in how his dictatorship centralized coercion, built a state apparatus, and disciplined regional caudillos, an infrastructure that later governments could eventually open. Democracy did not arrive automatically, but the post-1935 succession did produce a cautious opening under presidents Eleazar López Contreras and Isaías Medina Angarita as the political opposition pressed for change. 

Chavismo, by contrast, emerged through elections. It initially spoke the language of participation and inclusion, yet over time it systematically hollowed out checks and balances and concentrated authority in ways that destroyed institutional autonomy. In any case, neither model was indefinitely sustainable. Both eventually confronted moments of succession, and the question shifted from endurance to what, exactly, would replace them.

In both transitions, it was not ordinary domestic pressure that structurally broke the authoritarian bargain, but a decisive external shock. Gómez weathered conspiracies, incursions, and waves of dissent; in the end, only death removed him. For chavismo, the US extraction of Maduro abruptly altered the balance of power inside the ruling coalition, fracturing the status quo among factions and forcing them to operate under Washington’s shadow for the foreseeable future.

After 1935, López Contreras and Medina Angarita moved quickly to neutralize the most predatory residues of Gomecismo, including the family clique. They steered the system gradually toward institutional consolidation and political opening. Echoes of that succession moment now hover over Venezuelan politics. 

It is too soon to tell where this transition leads, who will define its project, or what counter-moves it will invite. If the Gómez precedent teaches anything, it is that once an authoritarian equilibrium is broken, restoring the old order is far harder than improvising a new one. Whether that improvisation produces a democratic opening, or a reconstituted chavismo capable of surviving even where Gomecismo could not, remains the central question.

The president says Mexico’s decision ‘to sell or give oil to Cuba for humanitarian reasons’ was a ‘sovereign’ one.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum says her country will continue to show “solidarity” with Cuba after media reports that her government halted a shipment of oil to Havana.

Mexico has in recent years become a top supplier of oil to Cuba, which relies on cut-price oil supplies from its allies to survive a US trade embargo and keep the lights on through a severe energy crisis.

Venezuela had been a major supplier of discounted crude to Cuba, but US President Donald Trump said he would halt the shipments after the United States military abducted long-term Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro this month.

As recently as December, Mexico was still sending oil to Cuba, but several media outlets, including Bloomberg and the Mexican newspaper Reforma, have reported that a shipment planned in January was called off.

Sheinbaum refused to confirm or deny the reports on Tuesday. She told reporters during her regular morning news conference that Mexico’s decision “to sell or give oil to Cuba for humanitarian reasons” was a “sovereign decision”.

“It is determined by [Mexican state oil company] Pemex based on the contracts, or, in any case, by the government, as a humanitarian decision to send it under certain circumstances,” Sheinbaum said.

When asked if Mexico would be resuming oil shipments to Cuba, the president sidestepped the question and said, “In any case, it will be reported”. She also said Mexico would “continue to show solidarity” with Cuba.

The Reuters news agency last week reported that the Mexican government was reviewing whether to keep sending oil to Cuba amid growing concerns within Sheinbaum’s government that continuing the shipments could put the country at odds with the US.

Trump on Tuesday told reporters that “Cuba will be failing very soon”, adding that Venezuela has ‌not ‌recently sent ⁠oil or money ‌to Cuba.

According to shipping data and internal documents from state company PDVSA, Venezuela has not sent crude or fuel to Cuba for about a month.

Last year, Mexico sent approximately 5,000 barrels per day to Cuba. With Venezuela’s shipments now offline, Mexico’s supplies are critical.

Demanding the release of Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores, South Africa’s largest trade union marched to the US consulate in Johannesburg on Saturday, January 24.

“In defending Venezuela, we defend the sovereignty of all nations,” concluded the memorandum read aloud outside the consulate by Irvin Jim, general secretary of the over 460,000 members-strong National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA).

“It is Venezuela today … It will be South Africa tomorrow,” Jim warned in his address to the demonstration. US President Donald Trump, who has bombed parts of Nigeria after concocting a false story about a “Christian Genocide” in the country, has also been spinning tales about a “White Genocide” underway in South Africa.

“This is not a joke,” NUMSA warned in a statement. “Donald Trump can easily use the lie of a White genocide in South Africa to invade South Africa, capture South Africa’s president and transport him to a jail in the US, and declare that he is now in charge of our country and all its natural wealth, whilst controlling all trade and natural wealth … After the US criminal military invasion of Venezuela, it is foolish to ignore” this threat to South Africa.

“There is a madman in the White House”

“There is a madman in the White House. There is a fascist in the White House,” NUMSA’s president, Andrew Chirwa, said in his opening address to the demonstration. “Today, it is Venezuela that was attacked by this international criminal. Tomorrow it is” Cuba, Iran, Nigeria,  South Africa. “All over the world this man” is baying “for blood.”

In parallel, the Trump administration is also attempting to strangle South Africa’s economy, threatening to exclude it from the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), which provides tariff-free access to the US market, on which the country’s automotive sector is heavily dependent.

“Our members and workers across various sectors are losing jobs” because “he has imposed 30% tariffs against South Africa,” Jim added in his speech.

Stressing the need for “an anti-imperialist front to mobilize the workers” across party and union affiliations, Jim said that NUMSA “will soon be convening a political colloquium”, inviting all progressive political parties. “It is about time to unite the working class … behind a  revolutionary agenda,” as South Africa faces increasing US aggression.  

South Africa punished for taking the genocidal state of Israel to the ICJ

South Africa, the union maintains, “is being punished by Trump for taking the genocidal state of Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ).” Reaffirming that “this was the correct position … in defense of the people of Palestine,” NUMSA called on the South African government not to cave in to the pressure by Leo Brent Bozell III, Trump’s new ambassador to South Africa.

At his Senate confirmation hearing, he had stated that if appointed, “I would press South Africa to end proceedings against Israel,” and the ICJ itself to stop what he deemed a “lawfare” against Israel.

“If he continues to insult our national sovereignty … by demanding that South Africa must withdraw its case in the ICJ against Israel,” NUMSA insists, “the South African government must act swiftly, and ensure that he packs his bags and leaves the country.”

The South African government must also “continue to demand the release of Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro and Comrade Cilia Flores in all international forums,” added the memorandum, which was also copied to the Minister of International Relations.

Demanding that the football governing body “cancel all World Cup matches in the US this year,” a copy of the memorandum was also sent to the FIFA President.

It further called on the African Union (AU) and the BRICS to urgently convene and formulate a coordinated and collective response to the US imperialist aggression.

“No country is safe from America’s greedy appetite”

Recalling the European leaders defending unipolarity under the cover of “rules-based order” at last year’s G20 summit in South Africa, the US had boycotted Alex Mashilo, spokesperson of the South African Communist Party (SACP) said in his address to the protest: “Little did they know that just after a few weeks, that unipolar power will turn against them and demand Greenland.”

Under “the mad Trump administration”, NUMSA emphasized in its statement, “no country is safe from America’s greedy appetite”.

​The US has now even “become extremely dangerous to itself” and “its citizens”, with Trump “brutalizing the American people daily” using “his personal ‘Gestapo’ police commonly known as ICE.”  ​

Expressing “solidarity with American citizens who are being brutalized by ICE,” NUMSA insisted, “This is a moment when all people of the world, including well-meaning US citizens and all South Africans, must unite” against imperialism.

Source: People’s Dispatch

Jan. 27 (UPI) — Venezuela’s interim president, Delcy Rodríguez, has reiterated comments made over the weekend that her country “does not take orders from any external actor,” saying the government answers only to the Venezuelan people.

Her remarks Monday followed recent statements by U.S. officials about Venezuela’s political and economic direction after the Jan. 3 U.S. military operation that captured former president Nicolás Maduro and his wife.

Rodríguez spoke during a public consultation on a partial reform of Venezuela’s Organic Hydrocarbons Law, according to local newspaper Últimas Noticias. She was responding to comments by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who suggested Washington could influence decisions by the Venezuelan executive branch and the timing of possible elections.

“The U.S. Treasury secretary has made statements that are inappropriate and offensive, and I have to respond to them,” Rodríguez said. “The people of Venezuela do not accept orders from any external actor. The people of Venezuela have a government and that government obeys the people.”

Her comments came shortly after Bessent said leaders of Venezuela’s executive branch would follow orders from President Donald Trump‘s administration.

“We have left members of the [Venezuelan] government in their positions and they will take charge of administering the country,” he said in an interview with the YouTube channel Derecha Diario TV. Bessent also suggested that other leaders could be placed “under custody,” without naming names, “for the benefit of the Venezuelan people.”

Bessent added that “Everyone says, ‘What if Venezuelan leaders return to their old habits?’ I think when they see the videos of the president being expelled from Caracas and in a cell in New York, they will follow U.S. orders.”

On Sunday, Rodriguez delivered a similar message during a meeting with oil workers in the eastern state of Anzoátegui, where she openly criticized foreign interference in Venezuela’s internal affairs.

“Enough of Washington giving orders to politicians in Venezuela. Let Venezuelan politics resolve our differences and internal conflicts,” she said, according to footage broadcast by state television network Venezolana de Televisión.

In her latest remarks, Rodríguez said Venezuela does not rule out relations with the United States as long as they are based on mutual respect.

“We are not afraid of respectful relations with the United States, but they must respect international law, Venezuela’s dignity and its history,” she said.

At an event Monday with business leaders and officials from the energy sector, Rodríguez also outlined the government’s projections for the oil industry — the country’s main source of revenue.

She said the government expects a 55% increase in oil investment by 2026 as part of a strategy to revive crude production, according to financial outlet Ámbito Financiero.

Investment in the sector totaled nearly $900 million last year and is projected to reach $1.4 billion in 2026. The plan is supported by a legal reform that has already passed a first reading in parliament.

The initiative seeks to loosen regulatory conditions and expand participation by domestic and foreign private companies. A central pillar of the reform using productive participation contracts, enabled under the so-called Anti-Blockade Law, which the executive branch describes as a successful model.

Rodríguez said these contracts have helped attract capital and boost production despite international sanctions, adding that 29 such agreements are in place.

“We have to move from being the country with the largest reserves on the planet to being a giant producer,” she said, defending a framework that keeps state ownership of resources while incorporating new management models.

During the hydrocarbons law consultation, Chevron Venezuela President Mariano Vela highlighted the company’s long-standing presence in the country, noting that Chevron has been a key partner in Venezuela’s oil industry for more than 100 years.

He thanked Chevron’s Venezuelan workers, joint venture employees and state oil company PDVSA for their long-term commitment to building “an even brighter future for the Venezuelan people.”

“We are prepared to continue contributing our operational expertise with technological innovation, hard work and the goal of creating a more competitive oil and gas sector,” Vela said.

Mérida, January 26, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Delegates from governments, parliaments, and social movements across the globe gathered in Bogotá, Colombia, on January 25 for the inaugural “Nuestra América” summit.

Convened by the Progressive International at the San Carlos Palace, the emergency congress aimed to establish a unified strategy against what participants described as a “rapidly escalating assault” on Latin American sovereignty.

The high-level meeting, featuring 90 people from more than 20 countries, took place against a backdrop of heightened regional tensions and the Trump administration’s express intent to impose its dictates in the Western hemisphere.

The summit was triggered by the events of January 3, when US forces launched “Operation Absolute Resolve,” involving targeted bombings in Caracas and surrounding areas. The attacks killed over 100 people and drew near-universal condemnation from progressive forces who blasted the operation as a flagrant violation of the UN Charter.

The military incursion saw special forces kidnap Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores. The pair will face trial in New York on charges including narco-trafficking conspiracy, to which both pleaded not guilty during the arraignment hearing on January 5. Venezuelan officials have repeatedly denounced the kidnapping and demanded Maduro and Flores’ release and return.

The “San Carlos Declaration,” adopted at the close of the Bogotá summit on Sunday, characterized the current moment as a “new age of colonial violence” driven by a “revived Monroe Doctrine and a new ‘Trump Corollary’”.

The text asserted that “the defense of sovereignty in the hemisphere is inseparable from the defense of international law at the global level,” calling for a “coordinated international solidarity” to halt US coercive actions.

“We, the delegates at the inaugural convening of Nuestra América in Bogotá, Colombia, affirm the shared horizon of: a hemisphere that governs itself, defends its peoples, and speaks in its own voice,” the document read. Delegates committed to a “common strategy” to “project Nuestra América as a force for sovereignty and solidarity.”

The gathering featured high-level bilateral exchanges, as well as working groups led by grassroots movements. The final statement emphasized the importance of popular power to defend working-class interests and build international solidarity.

In the coming weeks, the “Nuestra América” movement plans to intensify its diplomatic activity, with a second major meeting already scheduled to take place in Havana, Cuba.

Code Pink’s Latin America coordinator Michelle Ellner attended the Bogotá summit and told Venezuelanalysis that it is urgent to confront a US project of “hemispheric domination that combines military intervention, lawfare, and repression.”

“No country or movement alone can confront the US military and financial apparatus,” she argued. “But together, states, peoples and social movements can continue building an anti-imperialist movement that can sustain those who are currently fighting politically.”

Ellner noted that progressive movements have historically been fractured but that they need to go from “reaction to action.” The Venezuelan-US organizer explained that Code Pink and allied groups are coordinating legislative pressure and mobilizations within the US to challenge the “normalization of intervention.”

Acting government promotes “coexistence and peace”

In Venezuela, Acting President Delcy Rodríguez launched the “Program for Democratic Coexistence and Peace” on Friday during a televised broadcast.

According to Rodríguez, the initiative seeks to “heal the fractures” caused by political violence and “eradicate expressions of hate” that threaten national stability in the wake of the US’ recent attacks and threats.

The program is overseen by a diverse committee led by Minister of Culture Ernesto Villegas alongside several other cabinet members, former business leader Ricardo Cusanno, and various social activists. 

The acting president emphasized the need for political dialogue among different Venezuelan political forces without meddling from Washington and other foreign actors. The government announced plans to present a new law to the National Assembly to institutionalize the initiative.

In recent weeks, Venezuelan judicial authorities have likewise released opposition agents, some of them having been accused of treason and terrorism, as well as people accused of involvement in the unrest that followed the July 2024 presidential elections. Caracas has reported 626 released and invited the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to accompany the process.

Edited by Ricardo Vaz in Caracas.