By Stephen Lendman
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Republican and undemocratic Dem dark forces are waging political, economic, financial, sanctions, and hot wars against all independent nations unwilling to surrender their sovereignty to US interests.
Oil-rich countries are prime targets, notably Middle East ones and Venezuela because of its world’s largest reserves, a prize the US covets.
It’s been waging undeclared war on Venezuela’s social democratic government since Hugo Chavez’s December 1998 election.
What’s ongoing is the latest chapter of a diabolical plot to replace Bolivarian democracy with US-controlled fascist tyranny, wanting Big Oil and other US corporate predators enabled to loot Venezuelan resources, the country’s wealth transferred abroad, social benefits afforded to all Venezuelans abolished, Washington gaining another imperial trophy.
Support from Venezuela’s military is crucial for President Nicolas Maduro. Addressing them he said the following:
“I am a soldier, just like you. We dream and feel the same, equally love our homeland…I thank the armed forces, who are preparing for military exercises on February 10-15, that they mobilized in the name of the homeland.”
“We need top-level armed forces to guarantee territorial integrity and defense of the country.” With their support, “(i)mperialism will lose.”
He alone is Venezuela’s democratically elected president, its process scrupulously open, free and fair. Juan Guaido is a US-designated puppet with no legitimacy, plucked from obscurity to prominence, a traitor to his country, guilty of sedition or treason, bribed to serve US interests.
Interviewed by Sputnik News, Maduro discussed a range of issues. He thanked Vladimir Putin for “provid(ing) us with assistance…in every sense of the word…”
Russia’s president “told me that we would strengthen cooperation in the economy, trade, oil, gas, military affairs, in all areas,” including by providing Venezuela with “the most modern weapons in the world” – solely for defense, never for use against other nations or the Venezuelan people the way the US and its imperial partners operate.
Addressing Guaido’s complicity with the Trump regime, he said “(t)his is the constitutional issue of Venezuelan justice. As the head of state, I believe that it was the promotion of a coup d’etat, a violation of the Constitution.”
“But this is only the opinion of the head of state. The prosecutor general will have to act, and he has already begun to act, the Supreme Court will have to act — and it is already acting. And what the prosecutor’s office and the courts decide will be executed in the Venezuelan legal system.”
So far, an order to arrest and detain Guaido hasn’t been issued. “Let’s not rush. We will wait,” Maduro explained.
His actions flagrantly violated “the norms of international law…This is what we are going to demonstrate.”
Praising Venezuelan security forces charged with protecting him, he stressed that “there’s no doubt that Donald Trump had ordered to kill me. He told the Colombian government and the Colombian mafia to kill me.”
Since the CIA’s establishment in 1947, it’s operated as a secret unaccountable army of the state, prioritizing unlawful covert actions.
They include overthrowing democratically elected governments, assassinating heads of state and key officials, propping up friendly despots, kidnapping targeted individuals, disappearing them in torture prisons, and using an array of other state terror tactics.
The agency is a global mafia hit squad incompatible with democracy, operating with unchecked power – all sovereign independent leaders on its target list, Maduro a prime one.
Obama killed Hugo Chavez. Maduro could end up the same way. He fully understand the threat imperial America poses to him and Venezuelan sovereignty.
Asked if Russia is involved in protecting him, he said “I can’t tell you that. No comment. I’m not making any comment…I have no comment on that subject.”
Clearly it’s sensitive. Because of its ties to Venezuela, including large investments in the country, Russia may be helping to protect Maduro.
Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow will defend its interests in Venezuela, using “all mechanisms available to us” permitted under international law – with no further elaboration. Sino/Russian help is vital for Maduro. Both nations have significant investments in Venezuela to protect.
Maduro supports early National Assembly elections. He rules out a new presidential one. He was democratically reelected last May with two-thirds majority support. No justification exists for holding another election, Maduro saying:
The demand by the Trump regime and supportive US vassal states “is an absurd trick by some countries obsessed with Donald Trump’s policies.”
“We are returning to neo-colonialism when…Washington, can give orders to any country in Asia, Africa, Latin America, or the Caribbean.”
“(W)ho are they to decide here? I won 68% of the vote. That was a legitimate victory. He held elections through a transparent electronic system with international observation.”
“We don’t accept any ultimatum from anyone in the world, don’t accept blackmail. Venezuela’s presidential elections have been held, and if the imperialists want new elections, they’ll have to wait until 2025.”
Supported by constitutional and international law, Maduro is absolutely right. Another presidential election in the weeks or months ahead would amount to abrogating the rule of law by surrendering to imperial demands.
Maduro explained that for years, he extended outreach to US presidents. He sent messages to Trump about meeting, to establish “a dialogue, despite the political, cultural, and ideological differences between” him and DLT – to no avail.
He believes Bolton blocked diplomatic contact between both countries at the highest level. Seeking it now shows weakness, not strength.
Earlier it was a futile gesture. Washington doesn’t negotiate. It demands. Its promises when made are hollow, breached time and again in dealings with one country after another – why it can never be trusted.
The key US goal is “get(ing) (control over) Venezuelan oil since we have the biggest reserves of certified oil in the world,” Maduro correctly stressed, adding:
“We are certifying what is on track to become the biggest gold reserves in the world. We have a quarter of world’s gas. We have vast reserves of diamonds, huge reserves of drinking water, aluminum, and iron. We are a power in the field of energy resources, natural resources.”
Clearly the nation is resource rich, mainly its oil, though it’s highly unlikely to have one-fourth of the world’s natural gas, Russia and Iran having the largest known reserves.
Washington’s other key aim in Venezuela is wanting to eliminate the threat of a good example, a nation earmarking most of its wealth for social benefits for all its people, especially its most disadvantaged.
Maduro explained that thousands of US companies do business with Venezuela, operating in the country. “There are companies in the oil field like Chevron with large investments.”
“I say to American investors in the field of oil, gas, tourism, technology, gold, and diamonds: Despite the tense relations with Trump, you are welcome.”
“Let them invest and work in Venezuela. This tension should not prevent American investments in Venezuela. We welcome them.”
The stakes are huge in the struggle to preserve and protect Venezuelan sovereign independence from aims by the Trump regime to destroy it – what the scourge of imperialism is all about, humanity’s curse.
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