Spain’s Sánchez and Venezuela’s Delcy Rodríguez Agree to Keep Talking

Venezuela · Diplomacy

Venezuela’s acting president crossed the General Assembly hall to greet Spain’s prime minister. Madrid wants her at a November summit, but European sanctions stand in the way.

Spain’s prime minister and Venezuela’s acting president have agreed to keep talking. The Sánchez and Delcy Rodríguez exchange took place on Tuesday 22 September 2026, in the UN General Assembly hall.

Rodríguez walked over to Pedro Sánchez’s seat to greet him, the Spanish government said, and asked to keep discussing her country. Sánchez replied that he was of course willing, and that Spain is committed to the future of the region.

It was their first conversation in person since Rodríguez replaced Nicolás Maduro, whom US forces captured in Caracas on 3 January 2026. It also came hours before her first meeting with US President Donald Trump.

A greeting on the Assembly floor

Both leaders were in New York for the opening of the Assembly’s 81st session, the yearly gathering of world leaders. The chat came shortly before Trump addressed the chamber, the Madrid news site The Objective reported.

Libertad Digital, a conservative Spanish website, described Rodríguez crossing the floor to greet the Spanish delegation with hugs and kisses. No formal meeting between the two was planned in New York beyond that conversation, according to The Objective.

The account of what was said comes from the Spanish government, relayed by the EFE news agency.

Two phone calls before New York

The pair had spoken twice by phone this year. On 9 January, Sánchez backed a peaceful, negotiated and democratic transition, while Rodríguez proposed a broad bilateral agenda.

On 12 January, Sánchez said in Madrid that he had stressed “the need to keep freeing political prisoners” in that call. The second came on 25 June, after deadly earthquakes, when he offered Spanish help.

Prisoners touch Spain directly. On 8 January, Caracas freed five Spaniards, among them the journalist Miguel Moreno Dapena, held for 209 days.

The others included José María Basoa, Andrés Martínez Adasme, Ernesto Gorbe Cardona and the Spanish-Venezuelan Rocío San Miguel. Foro Penal, a Venezuelan legal-aid group, still counted 344 political prisoners on 18 September 2026.

The sanctions problem and a Madrid summit

Madrid wants Rodríguez at the Ibero-American Summit, a meeting of Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking nations, on 4 and 5 November. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares has said she would be invited.

The obstacle is Brussels. The European Union has sanctioned Rodríguez since 2018, including a ban on entering member states, El País reported.

Albares asked in February for those sanctions to be lifted, which needs the unanimous backing of all 27 member states. On 30 April, the European Parliament voted 507 to 31 to urge keeping sanctions on rights abusers until Venezuela moves toward democracy.

The rules do allow exemptions for intergovernmental meetings, a European Commission spokesperson told El País. Rodríguez used one in May to travel to The Hague for Venezuela’s border case against Guyana at the International Court of Justice.

Washington has moved faster. The United States lifted its own economic sanctions on Rodríguez in early April, El País reported.

The ban has a history in Spain. In January 2020, Rodríguez, then Maduro’s vice-president, met a Spanish minister, José Luis Ábalos, at Madrid’s Barajas airport, causing a political storm.

Where the opposition stands

The friendliness sits awkwardly with Spain’s role as host to Venezuela’s opposition. Edmundo González, the opposition’s candidate in the disputed election of 28 July 2024, has lived in exile in Spain since September 2024.

The opposition says González won that vote, which Maduro claimed. Spain recognised neither Maduro’s victory nor González as president-elect, Canal Sur, the Andalusian public broadcaster, noted.

González, who turned 77 on 29 August, is absent from transition talks that resumed in Caracas on 19 September. María Corina Machado, the opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner, is also absent.

Those talks pit Jorge Rodríguez, the National Assembly president and her brother, against an opposition team under Dinorah Figuera, El Español reported. On 16 September, González said “human rights are not a concession, nor can they depend on political circumstances.”

What comes next

Rodríguez was due to meet Trump at 7:40 p.m. New York time on Tuesday, according to the Colombian magazine Semana. El País of Cali called it the first such encounter since Barack Obama met Maduro in 2015.

She is also the first Venezuelan leader at the Assembly since Maduro in 2018, Libertad Digital noted. Maduro is held in a federal jail in Brooklyn on US drug-trafficking charges.

For Madrid, the aim is to keep a voice in Venezuela’s transition. After the Sánchez and Delcy Rodríguez encounter, her trip to Madrid in November depends as much on Brussels as on Sánchez.

More: Venezuela coverage, every day from The Rio Times.

Did Sánchez and Delcy Rodríguez hold a formal meeting?

No. According to the Spanish government, Rodríguez approached Sánchez’s seat in the General Assembly hall on 22 September 2026 to greet him. She asked to keep talking about Venezuela and he agreed. The Objective reported that no further meeting between them was planned in New York.

What is Delcy Rodríguez’s current title?

She is Venezuela’s acting president, in Spanish “presidenta encargada.” She took over after US forces captured Nicolás Maduro in Caracas on 3 January 2026. Before that she was Maduro’s vice-president.

Can Delcy Rodríguez travel to Spain?

European Union sanctions have barred her from entering member states since 2018. The rules allow exemptions for intergovernmental meetings, which Spain hopes to use for the Ibero-American Summit in Madrid on 4 and 5 November. Spain has also asked the EU to lift the sanctions, which requires unanimity.

Where is Edmundo González?

The Venezuelan opposition’s 2024 presidential candidate has lived in exile in Spain since September 2024. He is not taking part in the transition talks that resumed in Caracas on 19 September 2026.

Sources: EFE via Infobae on the New York exchange, The Objective on the earlier calls and the summit, Libertad Digital on the scene in the hall, El País on EU sanctions and exemptions, Antena 3 on the Spaniards freed in January, EFE via El Nuevo Diario on Sánchez and political prisoners, Foro Penal on the prisoner count, Canal Sur on Spain–Venezuela relations, El Español on the Caracas talks, El Nacional on González’s warning, Semana on the Trump meeting

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