Maduro distanced himself from the proposal to repeat elections

||AFP/National Agencies

**The president said that “Venezuela has sovereignty” and stressed that he does not practice “microphone diplomacy”**

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro yesterday distanced himself from the proposal made earlier by his Brazilian and Colombian counterparts to repeat the elections that gave him a third term amid allegations of fraud by the opposition.

Without mentioning the issue directly, Maduro insisted that “Venezuela has sovereignty” and “is an independent country.”

“I do not practice microphone diplomacy, I never do it,” the president told the official press team. “If not, then one becomes an advisor to other countries.”

“I will never say ‘Colombia, your government should do this’ and post advice on my social media, no. Every president knows, every state, every country knows what they should do with their internal affairs,” the Venezuelan president stressed.

He also rejected the idea that the United States government intends to become the electoral authority in Venezuela.

The head of state stressed that conflicts in Venezuela, of any nature, are resolved between Venezuelans and their institutions.

“I completely and absolutely reject the United States government trying to become the electoral authority in Venezuela or anywhere else in the world. They have to review the tremendous internal problem they have where Donald Trump says he will not recognize any result that is adverse to him and says that… if he loses there will be a civil war in the United States. They have many problems, let them keep their problem because Venezuela, here in our homeland, we Venezuelans rule,” he said.

GOOD NEWS

The head of state also indicated that the process of expert appraisal of the elections of July 28, which is being carried out by the Electoral Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ), has been reported to the public.

“I think it is good news for all of Venezuela that the Supreme Court of Justice in its Electoral Chamber is doing the work that we all expect it to do and that this electoral dispute, as the Constitution says, as the law says, is resolved in the highest instance that Venezuela created in its Constitution for this type of matters,” he added.