SAN LUIS POTOSÍ, Mexico.- The regime of Nicolás Maduro expelled from Venezuela to a delegation from the Spanish Popular Party that traveled to Caracas on Friday, invited by opposition leaders Edmundo González and María Corina Machado.
The 10 Spanish politicians, who had come to participate in the elections On Sunday, they were detained upon arrival at the Caracas airport, allegedly for not having the necessary permits to enter the country.
“I have just been informed that the PP delegation made up of 10 deputies, senators and MEPs is being held at Caracas airport by the Maduro regime. I demand their immediate release and that the Spanish Government provide the necessary means to this end,” wrote Alberto Núñez Feijóo, president of the Spanish Popular Party, on his social networks.
The authorities of the Maduro regime interrogated the Spanish parliamentarians upon their arrival and announced that they would be deported.
“The dictatorial and infamous regime of Nicolás Maduro has decided to expel us from the country and not allow us to enter with absurd and spurious arguments,” said deputy Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo from the cockpit of the plane. “We will return to celebrate the victory.”
As confirmed by the media ABCThe group had arrived in Caracas at nine o’clock at night, after almost ten hours of flight.
At the end of the hour-long detention by the Venezuelan authorities, a member of the delegation sent the first message to Madrid: “They are throwing us out.”
“They have not dared to put it in writing, even though we have asked them to,” he said in his transmission from the video Álvarez de Toledo. “They started by saying that we had voted in favour of sanctions against Venezuela, but it was not against the country but against the leaders of the regime and that was in the European Parliament,” he commented.
According to the representative of the Popular Party, when she asked Venezuelan officials if the decision was in line with the supposedly “free and democratic” elections proclaimed by the regime, the authorities answered that yes, “they are free and democratic.”
Although guests of opposition leaders are now being barred from entering, Maduro has approved the participation of Spanish politicians, such as former socialist president José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, and the founder of the Spanish party Podemos, Juan Carlos Monedero, who is also close to Chavismo.
When there were barely two days left until the presidential elections in Venezuelathe Nicolás Maduro regime blocked international electoral observers and other impartial observers within the country.
Panamanian President José Raúl Mulino announced on Friday that a flight to Venezuela carrying several former presidents who were to participate as electoral observers in next Sunday’s elections had been prevented from taking off from that Central American country.
“A Copa (Airlines) plane carrying (former) President (Mireya) Moscoso and other former presidents to Venezuela has not been allowed to take off from Tocumen while they remain on board, due to the blockade of Venezuelan airspace. Likewise, another Copa flight to Panama from Caracas has not been allowed to take off,” the Panamanian president reported on his official X account.
The above are part of the Freedom and Democracy Group, also composed of the Dominican president, Luis Abinader, and the former Spanish presidents José María Aznar and Mariano Rajoy; Mario Abdo Benítez, from Paraguay; Jeanine Áñez and Jorge Quiroga, from Bolivia; Felipe Calderón and Vicente Fox, from Mexico, and Iván Duque and Andrés Pastrana, from Colombia.
The blockade came after the group denounced that any attempt at fraud should be exposed to the international community.
Other international election observers said they would not travel to Venezuela to carry out these duties.
Brazil’s Supreme Electoral Court announced Wednesday that it has canceled plans to send aides following statements by Maduro that Brazil’s electoral records were not audited.
Former Argentine President Alberto Fernández, meanwhile, said he would not participate as an electoral spectator after the Maduro regime asked him to stay “away.”
The Chavista leader has launched a crusade against the Venezuelan opposition, whom he accuses of planning to ignore the results in order to launch acts of violence. He also said that the Armed Forces are loyal to him and could rise up against a possible opposition government.
At the closing of his political campaign, Maduro also asked the Venezuelan people to think carefully about the vote they will cast this Sunday at the polls, where the Chavista leader will seek a second re-election.
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