SANTA MARTA/BERLIN/WASHINGTON (own report) – In what is a huge affront to Latin American leaders, numerous EU heads of state and government, including Chancellor Friedrich Merz, torpedoed the summit arranged between the EU and the CELAC alliance on Sunday. The EU had previously attached great importance to the meeting as Europe seeks to regain some of its dwindling influence in the region and counter China’s growing presence. Statements made by the EU just a few days earlier praised “the strength and vitality of the partnership” with the subcontinent. Yet shortly before the summit Merz – along with French President Emmanuel Macron, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and other EU heads of state and government – cancelled their participation. The background to this decision is the US campaign of violence in the Caribbean. The Trump administration has repeatedly sunk boats and murdered dozens of people. When Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who has hosted the EU-CELAC summit, openly criticised extrajudicial killings, the United States slapped sanctions on him and Colombia. A number of senior EU officials and leaders of member states have chosen to boycott Petro and wreck their own summit. Driving this act of anticipatory obedience is the fear of reprisals from the Trump administration. Read more

BERLIN/CARACAS (own report) – The latest recipient of the ‘Nobel Peace Prize’, María Corina Machado, has pursued a policy of subversion and violent regime change in her country over many years. It is a policy that has in fact been supported over many years by one of Germany’s party foundations, the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, which is aligned to the free-market FDP. The NGO has greeted the award by saying it is “proud to have collaborated closely with her and her supporters for many years.” This “pride” actually attaches to working with an ultra-right-wing Venezuelan opposition politician who has been involved in several coup attempts in Venezuela and advocates US sanctions that have pushed the population of her own country into desperate poverty. In Europe, she works with the far-right alliance Patriots for Europe (PfE), an EU-wide bloc that includes the French party Rassemblement National (RN) and the Fidesz party of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. A PfE event in September, at which Machado delivered a speech, was held under the anti-migrant theme of “The Reconquista begins”. Machado maintains particularly close contacts with the Trump administration, which is now ramping up its pressure on the Venezuelan government headed by President Nicolás Maduro. The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to this individual results from a decision to promote Washington’s aggression against Caracas. Read more

BERLIN/CARACAS (Own report) - In the aftermath of the elections in Venezuela, the German government persists in recognizing the self-proclaimed president and failed putschist, Juan Guaidó, as the country's head of state. "Our support" for "interim president" Guaidó will continue, Miguel Berger, Minister of State in the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced. Guaidó, who declared himself "president" on January 23, 2019 - and whose calls for a coup d'état in the months that followed went unheeded despite the massive support of western powers - is, in the meantime, seen as increasingly marginalized among Venezuela's right-wing opposition. In view of the failure of the coup attempts, the former Spanish Prime Minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, called on the EU to change course in its relations to Venezuela. Continuing to recognize neither the elected President Nicolás Maduro nor the elected parliament but instead the non-elected Guaidó, "can lead to the greatest absurdity that the history of international law has known," Zapatero warns. Read more

CARACAS/BERLIN (Own report) - Serious allegations are being raised against a partner cooperating with Germany’s Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FDP) in the context of an attempted putsch: The US Bloomberg news agency has reported that opposition officers had planned to storm the presidential palace in Caracas, capture President Nicolás Maduro and stop the May 20 presidential elections. The conspiracy was discovered and several putschists were arrested in mid-May. According to Venezuela's military prosecutor’s investigations, an opposition politician María Corina Machado was involved in the attempted coup. Machado, who is said to be very popular within the military, denies the allegations. She is the leader of the "Vente Venezuela" party, which joined the "RELIAL" network last fall. The network was initiated and is backed by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation (FDP) and includes several parties who, in the past, have overthrown or attempted to overthrow democratically elected governments, for example in Honduras (2009) and in Paraguay (2012). Read more