Presidents of Paraguay and Uruguay criticize the left’s silence on dictatorships

In speeches at the Summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), held on Tuesday 24th, in Buenos Aires, the presidents of Uruguay, Luis Lacalle Pou, and of Paraguay, Mario Abdo Benítez, said what all leaders from the left have been silent: that CELAC welcomes, without any public reprimand and without any effective action, the three dictatorships in the region.

While the population of Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua flees their countries en masse to avoid the truculence and misery imposed by dictatorial regimes, the heads of government have a seat in CELAC.

Miguel Diáz-Canel, Cuban dictator, went to Buenos Aires; Nicolás Maduro, Venezuelan dictator, alleged issues related to his own security for not attending; and Daniel Ortega was not present, but sent representatives, as well as Maduro.

Organizations like CELAC cannot “have the character of a club of ideological friends,” said Lacalle Pou, center-right president, whose mandate in Uruguay began in 2020, in a speech on Tuesday.

Without citing any of the countries specifically, the Uruguayan was blunt:

“We talk about respect for democracy, institutions and human rights. But there are countries here that do not respect democracy, nor institutions, nor human rights.”

In the three dictatorships, opponents are persecuted and arrested; the fairness of the elections is suspected; there is famine and catastrophic economic indices; and mass departure of the population to neighboring countries and the United States.

All these problems were ignored during the summit.

This is exactly what the president of Paraguay addressed in his speech, focusing on the migratory crisis in Venezuela, “a reality that cannot be ignored”.

“Just as we are concerned about what happened in Peru and Brazil, we are also concerned – and this is the forum where we have to say – the massive exodus that we see in Venezuela”, declared Benítez, quoting the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR), which considers Venezuelan migration as the second largest in the world, after Syria.

“We cannot look away when more than 7 million Venezuelans left their homes asking for refuge” in the region, recalled Benítez, also from the center-right, whose term as president of Paraguay ends this year.

FREE ELECTIONS IN VENEZUELA

Aligned with the Latin American left, the President of Chile, Gabriel Boric, mentioned, in a lighter tone, the totalitarian regimes of the continent, demanding the release of political prisoners in Nicaragua and the holding of free elections in Venezuela.

“We express our willingness to collaborate in the dialogue of the different sectors of that country [Venezuela] to find a way out that allows free, fair and transparent elections to be held,” Boric said.

Regarding Nicaragua, the Chilean said that it is the “duty” of the Ortega government to advance towards the freedom of political prisoners, because “only with freedom and dignity can democracy and the well-being of the people be strengthened”.

With information from Revista Oeste