Peru’s response to countries that abstained from voting at the OAS assembly

RPP

Lima.-Peruvian Foreign Minister Javier González Olaechea confronted the 11 countries that, in the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS), abstained from voting on a resolution that demanded the regime of Nicolás Maduro immediately publish the minutes of the presidential elections held last Sunday in Venezuela.

In an extraordinary session held in Washington, the text received 17 votes in favor, none against, 11 abstentions – including Brazil, Colombia and Mexico – and five absences, so it did not obtain the support of the absolute majority of the members of the Pan-American organization necessary for its approval.

“First of all, I wish to express my full and unrestricted solidarity with [los líderes opositores] Edmundo González Urrutia and María Corina Machado, and the millions in Venezuela and abroad who aspire to live in freedom and not under the disgrace of a regime that has been in power for 25 years and almost 15 under Mr. Maduro and a group of leaders who support him,” González Olaechea stressed.

He then mentioned that abstaining from voting “is, at its core, a lack of will to express a clear position” on the verification of votes in the face of fraudulent elections. “But it is even worse for those who have not appeared, not even electronically or via the Internet, five members of this international organization,” he added with evident annoyance.

“So we ask why Latinobarometer tells us every year that our citizens, especially our youth, do not believe in politicians, do not believe in democracy or in the representative system? Because they see this, precisely; these 11 abstentions. Don’t we read the newspapers? Don’t we know that María Corina Machado and Edmundo González, the true legitimate elected president of Venezuela, have been indicted by the regime’s prosecutor?” he said.

González Olaechea, who unsuccessfully requested that the vote be held after the debates, considered that the process was born fraudulent. “The entire world and our citizens, I want everyone to know, aspired to a free democracy. The principle of primacy of reality tells us that Edmundo González has, as of today, 90% of the votes counted in the official valid minutes in his favor. Mr. Maduro will not be able to show his victory,” he said.

“Regardless of how weakly the rejection was, this is not an ideological defense but one of principles. My country welcomes more than a million Venezuelans. They are hard-working, honorable, honest. However, with the arbitrary measure of closing embassies and consular services, their own compatriots are deprived of the right to obtain a paperwork, a passport, a notarial procedure, to register a child. […] In the end, we are proving right our young people who do not believe us and reject us because we are not consistent,” he concluded.

At the end of his speech, the president of the Permanent Council of the OAS, Ronald Sanders, defended the right of member countries to vote according to their criteria. “For the first time in our organization, a minister has spoken more than any joint delegation. […] Countries have the right to vote as they wish, including abstaining and voting against a resolution. Each member state has voted according to the circumstances in which it finds itself, without accusations or threats,” he said.

The resolution on Venezuela was supported by Argentina, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, the United States, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, the Dominican Republic, Suriname and Uruguay. Antigua and Barbuda, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Grenada, Honduras, Saint Kitts and Nevis and Saint Lucia abstained.

During her speech, an attendee protested in favor of former President Pedro Castillo, who is in prison for attempting a self-coup in 2022.

Dominica, Mexico, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Trinidad and Tobago did not participate in the session, as did Venezuela, which has been absent for some time. In a subsequent message posted on X, formerly Twitter, opposition leaders Edmundo González Urrutia and María Corina Machado thanked the government of Dina Boluarte for its “firm defense of the democratic cause” and its “support for democratic re-institutionalization” in Caracas.