<h6><strong>Eduardo González</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez, stated this Monday that he has conveyed to the acting president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, the “need to continue releasing political prisoners” and praised “the work that” former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero is doing “precisely” in this regard. The previous day, the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, accused Sánchez and Zapatero of complicity with the Venezuelan regime of the ousted Nicolás Maduro and warned that “history will not forgive them, history will judge them.”</strong></h4> “Indeed, I had the opportunity to speak with interim president Delcy Rodríguez and with opposition leader Edmundo González, who, as you know, lives in Venezuela with refugee status, like many other opposition leaders,” Sánchez declared at a press conference after meeting with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis at the Moncloa Palace complex, referring to the telephone conversation he had with both of them last Friday, January 9. “What I conveyed to the interim president of Venezuela is the need to continue releasing political prisoners,” he affirmed. “We also expressed our willingness to work together with the interim president of Venezuela and with the Venezuelan opposition to pave the way for a transition that must be peaceful and inclusive; that is to say, all sectors of Venezuelan society must be involved in this transition toward democracy and free elections,” he continued. “Ultimately, if anyone has to decide the future of Venezuela, it is the Venezuelan people themselves, and what the rest of the world must do is contribute to this transition: free, transparent, and fair elections, and a fully legitimate government,” he added. “Like many others, I must also acknowledge the work that President Zapatero is doing, precisely for the release of political prisoners,” Sánchez declared. “I believe that his good work, along with other political actors, is making it possible for us to see political prisoners being released in Venezuela,” he added. <h5><strong>Albares</strong></h5> For his part, Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares asserted this Monday that the Spanish government “is the only one that has always taken a stand” in Venezuela. “We have denounced each and every arbitrary detention, each and every human rights violation that has occurred. We have not recognized—and we were the first country in the world to say so—the official records of the 2024 elections because they could not be verified,” he continued during his address at the Ateneo Breakfasts at the Ateneo in Madrid. “This government has imposed sanctions on Venezuela, but it is also this government that has clearly stated that a unilateral use of force by a third country is contrary to international law, and that peace and democracy have never been achieved through force and violence; only chaos,” he added. “Therefore, we are neither neutral nor do we want to please anyone,” he asserted. “We are always guided by a consistent course, which is to want for the people of Venezuela exactly the same things we want for all the peoples of Latin America, the same things we want for the Spanish people: peace, democracy, justice, and social progress,” he concluded. <h5><strong>Feijóo</strong></h5> At the closing of the 28th Interparliamentary Meeting of the People's Party (PP), Feijóo accused Sánchez and Zapatero this Sunday of having been in cahoots with the Maduro regime for years. “No amount of whitewashing can cover up so much filth,” he declared. “History will not forgive them; history will judge them,” he warned. Faced with a “government that is ambiguous regarding dictatorships, we will not choose the wrong allies. The PP will not be seen with populist leaders who ruin their countries,” he asserted. According to Feijóo, Venezuela is “at the beginning of the end of a deceitful, criminal and miserable dictatorship”, but the job cannot be considered finished “until all political prisoners are released, until all those who were exiled return home, until the regime is completely defeated and until the Venezuelan people regain the definitive course of their destiny”.
