President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) stated this Friday (6) that he will not break off trade relations with Venezuela even with dictator Nicolás Maduro’s refusal to present the voting records that would prove his alleged reelection. He also criticized the sanctions imposed on the country that, he says, harm the Venezuelan people.
“We are now in a position between Brazil and Colombia [em que] We do not accept the result of the elections, but I will not break off relations. And I also do not agree with the unilateral punishment, the blockade, because it does not harm Maduro. The blockade harms the people, and I think the people should not be victims of this,” he said in an interview with the radio. Diffuser from Goiânia, where he fulfilled his agenda in the morning.
Lula’s statement comes at a time when he is being urged to toughen his stance against Maduro after the Venezuelan justice system accepted a request from the country’s Public Prosecutor’s Office to arrest opposition candidate Edmundo González. At least 12 countries in the Americas have already condemned the lawsuit.
Despite continuing to adopt a diplomatic tone with Colombia in which he demands the public and official release of the voting records, Lula once again criticized the way Maduro has been running the country’s government.
“Maduro’s behavior leaves much to be desired. Here in Brazil, we learned to build democracy with much suffering. […] Maduro, as president, should say ‘I will prove that I am the people’s favorite’, but he doesn’t do it”, Lula pointed out.
When comparing the difficulty of supposedly “making democracy” in Brazil, Lula stated that former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL) “was a coward” after the end of the 2022 election and that “he left for the United States and left his quarrels to riot at the doors of military barracks with the prospect of not letting me take office”.
“They were going to do it on the 1st [de janeiro de 2023]but they didn’t have the courage because there were too many people. So they waited for the moment when we weren’t expecting it anymore and decided to carry out a coup”, he said.
Lula was criticized on Thursday (5) by Human Rights Watch for the Americas for not toughening his stance against Maduro after the arrest warrant against González. “The minimum entry point for any negotiation should be the revocation of this order,” said Juanita Goebertus, director of the organization.
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