"Guaido organized a circus at the international level": the Venezuelan vice-president about the opposition and the US attempts to overthrow Maduro

- At a press conference with Sergey Lavrov, you stated that Caracas would take measures to return some of its assets frozen by the governments of the United States and Great Britain. What will these measures be? What are the benefits of moving the office of the oil company PDVSA from Lisbon to the Russian capital?

- In fact, the United States pursues predatory policies, appropriating the assets of Venezuela and thus violating the legitimate interests of our country, in particular with regard to Citgo, a PDVSA subsidiary in the United States. In this case, they do not even allow us to exercise our right to protection. They violate all existing international investment rules.

I want to ask international investors who see the situation in Venezuela if they are ready to invest in this country. As for Europe, where Venezuela’s accounts were frozen, we have already begun to take specific legal and legal steps: we hired lawyers to protect our interests, primarily in terms of gold, which the Bank of England is now illegally holding. We also began to take measures for the legal protection of Venezuela. We are talking about the theft of assets of Venezuela, which was organized by the United States. And Venezuela has the right to protect its legitimate interests.

As for the transfer of the PDVSA office from Europe to Moscow, this is connected with the expansion of cooperation with the Russian company in the field of energy, in the field of oil and gas. And now the most important is the expansion and strengthening of this cooperation. Therefore, moving the company's office is very timely. Together with the European office of PDVSA, other branches of the company will also move to Moscow.

“We would also like to talk about Juan Guaido, who, so to speak, went on a“ tour ”to Latin American countries. For example, he was accepted in Brazil, Argentina and other countries. What do you think about these meetings?

- I will answer you as a citizen of Venezuela. And I can say that I am ashamed of him. This man not only makes himself a mockery of his country, but now also arranges a circus internationally. He simply proclaimed himself president of Venezuela in the town square. And now it demonstrates the same behavior (which seems to be rather extravagant for Venezuela) in other countries, let's say, in particular countries whose government is subordinate to the United States. This man gave a real farce to the world community.

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- Recently, Guaido said it wants to return to Venezuela on Monday. And it is quite possible that he will be detained by the decision of the Supreme Court. What do you think, what could be the course of events in case of his return?

- I repeat once again, I am ashamed of him. A politician, a man who calls himself a politician and who seeks support from Marco Rubio, Bolton, Mike Pence or Trump, threatens the president of the republic. They threaten the president with violence if the Venezuelan government takes some action. As I said yesterday at a press conference with Minister Lavrov, fortunately, Venezuela is a strong and solid rule of law, with a developed democracy, whose institutions of power stand up for the national law and the constitution of the republic.

At the moment, there is a systematic, permanent violation of the national Constitution. And we are talking about a citizen of Venezuela (I don’t even know if he has the right to call it that), who conspires with the governments of other countries to overthrow the constitutional government. Such actions are prosecuted by criminal law, also for this is provided for the regulatory framework that guides our authorities. And they are already taking the necessary measures and will continue to defend our legal state.

- At a press conference yesterday, you and Sergey Lavrov talked about fake humanitarian aid. And this is another excuse to put pressure on Venezuela, because it prohibits the importation of humanitarian aid. Recently, attempts to illegally import some tools to overthrow the government of Nicolas Maduro were also discovered.

- Nothing new. We already know from history that the United States used the cover of humanitarian aid to bring weapons into the countries where they wanted to overthrow the regimes. We also know that in the situation with Venezuela it was a false humanitarian aid. If the US really wanted to help Venezuela, they would not block the country: neither economically nor commercially. They would not have hunted Venezuela. All this is just a farce. They are not looking for ways to help. And on February 23 the whole world saw that in this so-called "help" there was neither medicine nor products. There were only materials to support violence. Again, nothing new. This is an imperialist scenario. And we know who is behind this whole operation.

This is a scenario that repeats, but previously it was not possible to implement in Venezuela. From 2014 to 2017, in Venezuela, they tried to organize the so-called “Arab Spring”, but these attempts failed. This plan will not be possible to realize to Venezuela, because the people of Venezuela are the people of peace and tranquility.

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- There are many contact groups, and many countries offer to be intermediaries. But is the opposition ready for dialogue?

- The opposition wants the US to do everything for them. The opposition wants the United States and a group of other countries to come and overthrow the president of the republic. This is regrettable. I already talked about this at a press conference. On the 23rd, the presidents of Chile, Paraguay, and Colombia went to Cucuta to organize a terrible provocation against Venezuela, which led to armed clashes. Where was the deputy from the Guayido faction at that moment? The Venezuelan opposition constantly wants everyone to do everything for them, they simply say to the United States: "Overthrow the president so that I can come to power." And they are very mistaken. Because in the case of military intervention bombs will fall on their homes. Therefore, it is necessary to sit at the negotiating table and solve the internal problems of the Venezuelans.