The Diplomat
The government of Nicolás Maduro has relieved its Chargé d’Affaires ad interim in Madrid, Mauricio Rodríguez Gelfenstein, who had been in charge of the embassy since February 2018, following the departure of Ambassador Mario Isea.
Rodriguez Gelfenstein’s replacement is Coromoto Godoy Calderon, a diplomat who previously served as ambassador to Trinidad and Tobago and India.
Coromoto Godoy, who apparently has a close friendship with Maduro, is already in Madrid and one of her first acts, as she herself indicated on Twitter was to take flowers to the monument to Simón Bolivar, which is located in the Parque del Oeste. “I arrived in Madrid and I came to see you, Father Bolivar, as Chavez taught us, to renew strength, to swear loyalty to you. I came to see you as a daughter to a father. Show me the way, give me your hand and guide my steps in this new stage”, wrote Godoy. And added: “Father Bolivar, you have not plowed in the sea, your daughters and sons continue fighting for a free and sovereign homeland. What happiness to have brought him flowers and to be able to talk to him. Now my administration has begun”.
Spain and Venezuela maintain their diplomatic representations at the level of Chargé d’Affaires ad interim, a lower level than that of ambassadors, although recently the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, left the door open to a normalization of relations in that sense, in a statement to the newspaper El País.
The current Chargé d’Affaires with Letters of Cabinet of Spain in Caracas is, since a little more than a year ago, Ramón Santos, who filled the vacancy left by Juan Fernández Trigo when he was appointed Secretary of State for Ibero-America. This, in turn, had replaced Jesús Silva at the head of the Embassy, who did have the category of ambassador.
The change at the head of the Embassy in Madrid comes at a time when the Venezuelan Government and opposition have resumed dialogue in Mexico and both Spain and the EU have given unequivocal signs of their willingness to ease sanctions if progress is made.
