venezuela

Yesterday, the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations announced passage of VERDAD, an act to "confront the crisis in Venezuela." In all the years I've been reporting on Venezuela's gargantuan corruption, this is the most promising action yet.

"Norway commends the parties for their efforts. We reiterate our willingness to continue supporting the search for a peaceful solution for the country." That's part of the official statement.

Venezuela has been producing incredible amounts of stories lately, about uprisings, arrangements with chavista officials, about Russian and American mercenaries, about meetings, about how Maduro has a plane waiting to leave with Cilia, about how billions of dollars looted from the country will be recovered by friends of Leopoldo and Guaidó, about military invasions, about the debt... There are parties that would like to see Guaido fail, so they have a chance to recoup some of the money. There are parties that are gearing up for years of litigation.

It started before dawn. Juan Guaido, flanked by Leopoldo Lopez, were around La Carlota (military airport in East Caracas). Guaido made calls to transition and the start of "Operación Libertad". Lopez shouldn't have been there. House arrest conditions under SEBIN's watch meant that his symbolic presence had -at the very least- been allowed by SEBIN higher beings. Guaido and Lopez were surrounded by army, which meant some level of support. They were there, right by La Carlota for hours, i.e. whatever military contingent based in La Carlota did not attack, seek arrests.

Early this morning, Juan Guaidó made rallying calls from La Carlota, a military base in West Caracas. Guaidó was flanked by Leopoldo Lopez, who had been under house arrest and is prohibited from leaving his home or making public announcements.

Better to follow latest through local radio (https://rcr.tv/), social media and Twitter that we will be updating regularly.

Juan Guaidó, the self appointed, interim President of Venezuela is in a pickle. So are those who pushed him to assume a role that should have ended already. Everything started on false, or impossible, premises. Cese de la usurpación they called it, whatever the f*&% that means. The hope was that Nicolas Maduro would relinquish power. As if dictators / criminals of such ilk just wake up one day, knowing that without power and protection that office provides they're as good as dead, and just come to the realisation that time's up.

Canada announced a new set of sanctions on 43 individuals two days ago (see below). There's a few interesting names in there, folk linked to chavista repressive apparatus, First Lady, armed forces and intelligence, Venezuela's Treasury, judiciary, telecoms (CONATEL), mining, governors -one Rafael Lacava associated to Boston Group... The ones this site is interested the most are those linked to PDVSA. That's where Reinaldo Muñoz Pedroza slots in.

Via Gotham City we learn of a probe that FINMA, the Swiss financial watchdog, is doing on Julius Baer, one of the boliburgeoisie favourite money laundering banks.

$1,305,592,000,000 (please have this number in mind -one trillion, three hundred and five billion, five hundred and ninety-two million dollars- as you read through). Two very charitable chaps from Cleary Gottlieb, Richard J. Cooper and Mark A. Walker, have published a paper on Venezuela's debt, entitled "Venezuela's Restructuring: A Path Forward" (see below with added comments). It is work that shows the kinds of problems a future administration will have to deal with ($191.4 billion debt) in terms of pleasing the country's creditors.

Depending on where people stand in the political sphere, there's never a shortage of villains. In the UK, at this point in time, there's almost universal consensus about number 10's current resident. The fact that a fanboy of Castro and Chavez stands across the aisle shows just how debased politics can become, even in very advanced democracies. What hope then, for a banana republic like Venezuela?