He European Parliament will vote tomorrow on a resolution promoted by the European People’s Party, the ultraconservatives and the far right of the Patriots for Europe to recognize the opposition leader Edmundo González as the legitimate president of Venezuela and to ask the European Union (EU) and its Member States to do the same.
According to the criteria of
The text, which has been negotiated during this week in plenary in Strasbourg (France), will reach the hemicycle tomorrow Thursday at noon and for the moment two voting blocks are emerging, a much smaller consensus than that achieved at the same stage with the opposition leader. Juan Guaidó in 2021.
The majority that is being built unites the European People’s Party with the European Conservatives and Reformists (which includes Fratelli d’Italia, the party of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni) and the Patriots for Europe, the far-right group that has included the Spanish party Vox since the beginning of July.
The Europe of Sovereign Nationsa second far-right group, has not sat down at the negotiating table but various sources believe that at least some of its thirty members could vote yes, which puts them at around 50% of the chamber in favour for a vote in which only a simple majority is needed: more yeses than noes.
Together as a bloc they would total 375 seats out of 720. Patriots sources believe that individual delegations from outside these four groups could also join their text and vote in favour.
Opposite them are the social democrats, liberals, greens and the left, who set a red line for the recognition of González as president for various reasons despite agreeing, according to a socialist source, with up to “95%” of the rest of the text regarding the denunciation of repression, the condemnation of arbitrary arrests or the support of European sanctions against the regime of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
Specifically, the source pointed out that neither the European Union nor any of its countries individually recognise Edmundo González as president, while in the international community only Panama and Ecuador do so. Furthermore, he points out that even with “indicators” of what the result could have been, greater legitimacy is needed to make such a recognition.
Finally, they also warn that “beyond moral debates” the recognition of Juan Guaidó as interim president of Venezuela in January 2019 with a broad consensus of the European Parliament “has failed” and has not achieved the objectives it sought, in addition to making dialogue with the Maduro regime difficult and “poisoning” the EU’s relations with all of Latin America.
The context
This will be the first time in the current legislature that the European People’s Party has voted with the far right rather than with the bloc to its left in the hemicycle, and the resolution has a high probability of being approved.
At least the Social Democrats and the Liberals will present amendments, although they will do so separately as they have not managed to agree on the terminology. While the latter recognise González as the winner of the elections, the former want to reject the legitimacy of the elections last July and urge that the minutes be published and the will of the people be respected.
According to the text, the MEPs urge the European Union and its member states to do “everything possible” to ensure that González can assume the presidency on 10 January 2025 and to request an international arrest warrant against Nicolás Maduro for crimes against humanity.
They also call on governments and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy, Josep Borrell, to reinstate sanctions against members of the National Electoral Council (CNE) of Venezuela “as a sign of good will” and that the rest of the sanctions against the regime be prolonged and expanded.
If the agreement is approved, the European Parliament would symbolically go further than the Council of the European Union, whose foreign ministers are responsible for community foreign policy and who at the end of August decided not to recognise Maduro as president, but also not to do so with the opposition leader.
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