The end of sanctions against Venezuela is a pending issue

By Roberto Morejón

Sign of the new times, the United States could not impose in Latin America a new conference to apply more sanctions against Venezuela, since not even the impudent Lima Group is still alive.

At the request of President Gustavo Petro, Colombia hosted an ephemeral International Conference on the Political Process in Venezuela, with about twenty participants, including countries from Latin America, Europe and the United States.

From the inaugural speech of the Colombian President, the urgency of putting an end to the sanctions against Venezuela, whose people are suffering the effects, was clear.

However, the time has not yet come, because that is what some people want, for the authors of the punishments, such as the United States and its allies, to abandon these positions unilaterally, because they violate international law.

The Conference held in Bogota associated the need to establish a timetable allowing the holding of what it called free and transparent elections with full guarantees for all Venezuelan actors, to the parallel lifting of the penalties.  

The congregates advocated the unblocking of the dialogues between the Venezuelan government and the hard sector of the opposition, based in Mexico, and to which Caracas claims it will not rejoin as long as partial agreements are not complied with.

Among them is the release by the United States of the money destined to the single trust fund for social investment in Venezuela, that is, 3.2 billion dollars from the resources of the South American country, immobilized by the punishments.

The meeting in the Colombian capital agreed to call for the creation of the fund for social investment, but Washington is moving morosely.

All the above was achieved in a few hours despite the boycott attempt of the opposition Juan Guaidó, stripped by his own accomplices of the anachronistic title of "president in charge".

Guaidó was not invited to Bogotá, but tried to arrive, before which Colombian authorities drove him to the airport. From there he traveled to Miami, where he feels at ease.

In spite of the nuances and the difficulties to reach consensus on the situation in Venezuela, there is no doubt that in the Bogota meeting, expected phrases were heard, such as the one pronounced by Petro when he said: "the region cannot be a space for sanctions, but for freedom and democracy".