Félix Plasencia plans to meet with US officials to begin the reopening of the Venezuelan embassy in Washington. The trip coincides with the visit of María Corina Machado, in a parallel fight for the support of Donald Trump
Venezuelan diplomat Félix Plasencia plans to travel to Washington this Thursday to hold meetings with United States officials and take the first steps towards reopening the Venezuelan embassy in that capital, according to Venezuelan and American people familiar with the matter.
If it comes to fruition, it would be the first official visit in years by a representative of Chavismo to Washington. The movement occurs in the midst of the accelerated thaw in bilateral relations after the capture of Nicolás Maduro by US special forces on January 3, according to what was reported by The New York Times.
Plasencia’s arrival is scheduled for the same day that President Donald Trump will receive opposition leader María Corina Machado in Washington, which adds an element of competition between the different Venezuelan political actors for the favor of the American president.
Plasencia, a career diplomat and current Venezuelan ambassador to the United Kingdom, is a close ally of Delcy Rodríguez and J Jorge Rodríguez. It is not yet clear who the interim envoy will meet in the US capital. He was asked by the NYT but declined to comment on the trip and the State Department did not immediately respond to a request for information. Bloomberg He had already informed about the visit.
Venezuela broke relations with the United States in 2019. Last Friday, a US delegation led by John McNamara, chargé d’affaires for Venezuela based in Colombia, visited Caracas to conduct an “initial assessment” of a possible gradual reopening, a State Department spokeswoman reported. McNamara did not hold meetings with senior Venezuelan officials during that visit, the official said. New York Times.
Who is Félix Plasencia?
Félix Plasencia is a career diplomat who built his career with a discreet profile and solid academic training, before becoming a central piece of the foreign policy of the Nicolás Maduro administration. Graduated in International Studies from the Central University of Venezuela (UCV), he has a master’s degree in European Studies from the Catholic University of Leuven and a postgraduate degree in Diplomatic Studies from New College of the University of Oxford.
He entered the foreign service in 1991. He declared himself a Chavista since Hugo Chávez came to power, but his name did not appear for years in the front line of the ruling party.
The turning point of his career came with his personal and political connection with Delcy and Jorge Rodríguez. The relationship was forged in London, during Rafael Caldera’s second term, and was later consolidated with shared responsibilities in Caracas and in the Foreign Ministry. Under the management of Delcy Rodríguez as Foreign Minister (2014-2017), Plasencia held key positions: Director of Protocol, Vice Minister for Asia, the Middle East and Oceania, Vice Minister for Multilateral Issues and Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In 2019 he was Minister of Tourism and Foreign Trade and was part of contacts with international actors, including the International Contact Group and the visit of the then UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet. That same year he joined the ruling party’s negotiating team in the dialogue facilitated by Norway in Barbados, without concrete results after multiple rounds.
His name gained public notoriety due to the episode known as “Delcygate”, in January 2020, when he traveled to Madrid for the Fitur fair with Delcy Rodríguez. At the Barajas airport there was a meeting with the then Spanish minister José Luis Ábalos, which generated a political and judicial controversy in Spain, which was finally archived. Plasencia was pointed out as a key figure in the official explanations about that episode.
After the controversy, Maduro appointed him ambassador to China, one of Venezuela’s strategic partners. A year later, in August 2021, he was appointed chancellor, replacing Jorge Arreaza.
In 2022 he was appointed ambassador to Colombia, within the framework of the reestablishment of bilateral relations after more than three years of rupture. Before taking office, he directed the International Center for Productive Investment of Venezuela, an organization created to promote projects and attract investments abroad, which Alex Saab now controls.
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*Journalism in Venezuela is carried out in a hostile environment for the press with dozens of legal instruments in place to punish the word, especially the laws “against hate”, “against fascism” and “against the blockade”. This content was written taking into consideration the threats and limits that, consequently, have been imposed on the dissemination of information from within the country.
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