Borja Sánchez-Trillo / EPA
Protest in Madrid against the United States attack on Venezuela
The protest criticizes the United States intervention in Venezuela and the oil interests behind the attack.
Thousands of protesters gathered today in front of the United States Embassy in Madrid to denounce “imperialist aggression” to Venezuela, after the kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro during an American military operation.
An image of Donald Trump drinking from an oil drum painted with the colors of the Venezuelan flag and the words “Trump aggressor” and “imperialist aggression” filled some of the posters and banners held up during the morning by the protesters.
According to the French agency AFP, several flags from the Spanish party Podemos or the Communist Party of Spain (PCE) could be seen among the Venezuelan flags waved in front of the embassy, in the center of Madrid, one day after the capture of Nicolás Maduro by the United States.
Maduro and his wife, Cília Fortes, have been together since Saturday in custody at a federal prison in BrooklynNew York, after being captured in Caracas, the Venezuelan capital.
The Venezuelan leader is expected to appear before a federal judge in Manhattan in the coming days.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, whose country gave asylum to the opposition candidate for the 2024 Venezuelan presidential elections, Edmundo González Urrutia, had already condemned on Saturday “an intervention that violates international law”, considering that this operation “pushed the region towards a horizon of uncertainty and warmongering”, and called for a “fair and dialoguing” transition.
Pedro Sánchez reiterated his criticisms today in a letter addressed to members of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party (PSOE) in which he evokes “the recent violation of international law in Venezuela”, an act he condemned “with the utmost firmness”.
The United States launched “a large-scale attack against Venezuela” on Saturday, which captured the Venezuelan President and his wife, and announced that will govern the country until a transition of power is completed.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court of Justice of Venezuela handed over the interim presidency to the executive vice-president, Delcy Rodriguez, “in order to guarantee administrative continuity and the integral defense of the nation”.
It is not yet known when she will take office, but Delcy Rodriguez, who will be the first woman in the country’s history to lead the executive, has already demanded “immediate release” of Nicolás Maduro, “the only President of Venezuela”, and condemned the United States military operation.
The international community has been divided between condemnation of the United States’ actions and jubilation over Maduro’s fall.
