Venezuela: Maduro demands lifting of sanctions to hold elections

The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, has made the lifting of sanctions in the framework of the dialogue between the Chavista regime and sectors of the Venezuelan opposition in Mexico City a condition for holding elections in the Latin American country.

In this sense, he has specified that the sanctions that weigh on the oil industry “violate the laws of free trade” and “free production”, at the same time that he has stressed that the recent measures taken by the United States, which authorized the oil company Chevron to resume its extraction operations in Venezuela in a “limited” manner, “are not enough”.

“We are going to achieve sooner rather than later that Venezuela be freed from all criminal sanctions: 763 criminal sanctions that are like a sword on the neck and jugular of all Venezuelans,” he said.

“I wanted to celebrate with you the success of the agreement. I think they brought me the agreement signed last Saturday, November 26 in Mexico”, he said, adding that it was a pact “intensively worked on”, with components of a “social nature”.

“Its essence is the recovery of more than US$3 billion dollars retained, frozen, kidnapped in bank accounts in the United States and Europe that belong to the Venezuelan State,” he assured during a press conference.

With information from La Gaceta