I will not recognize Maduro if the minutes are not presented

Colombian President Gustavo Petro said on Wednesday that his country and Brazil will not recognize the results presented by the National Electoral Council that give Nicolás Maduro the victory in the Venezuelan presidential elections if the minutes of the votes are not presented. elections held on July 28.

“I’m going to talk with President Lula now. We agreed on one point: if there is no presentation of the minutes, there is no recognition,” Petro said in an interview with CNN in New York, where he is participating in the UN General Assembly.

The Colombian president and his Mexican and Brazilian counterparts, Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, respectively, have tried to mediate in the crisis that Venezuela has been experiencing since the National Electoral Council (CNE) of that country announced Maduro’s disputed victory.

Neither of these countries has yet recognized Maduro, but neither have they opted for the victory of opposition leader Edmundo González Urrutia, and they are betting on asking for the electoral records to be published and opening avenues for dialogue between the parties.

However, this is the first time that Petro has said that neither his country nor Brazil will recognize Maduro if the minutes are not presented.

«Previous error»

For Petro, there was a “previous error” before the Venezuelan elections because “a society was forced to dispute political power without freedom, and the issue of freedom applies to all the sides that are fighting.”

“There was no freedom for the opposition, because the main candidate (María Corina Machado) did not participate and it is a problem today because, who do you talk to in Venezuela on the side of the opposition? And for the side of the Venezuelan government as well because a country under economic sanctions is not free to vote,” said the head of state.

According to the Colombian, all the actors are now “trapped” in the crisis.

“In the face of this situation, you have an opposition that feels like it is the government but is not in the government, and a government that did not release the minutes, which therefore cannot legitimize the elections, but which is in the government.”

These are “two absolutely polarised and distant positions”, to which, he believes, must be added the US presidential elections in November, which, he believes, will influence the situation in the country.

To date, the CNE has not published the disaggregated results – as established in its schedule – despite numerous requests from the opposition and a large part of the international community.

Meanwhile, the majority opposition – grouped in the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD) – maintains that its standard-bearer, González Urrutia, is the winner of the elections based on 83.5% of the electoral records, collected by witnesses and table members on election day, to reinforce its claim..