VENEZUELAN President Nicolas Maduro warned his country’s right-wing opposition leaders on Tuesday not to stir up violent unrest as the threat of a recall vote against him waned.
National Electoral Council (CNE) president Tibisay Lucena indicated that a recall referendum was unlikely before January next year, the halfway point in Mr Maduro’s six-year term of office. If held by January 10, a successful recall vote would trigger a new presidential election, but after that date Vice-President Aristobulo Isturiz, a popular former teachers’ union leader, would automatically take over.
Mr Maduro lambasted the Democratic Unity Roundtable (Mud) coalition on his weekly TV programme, saying: “The violent plans that you have will be defeated by the conscience of a majority of the people.”
International solidarity can ensure that Trump and his machine cannot prevail without a level of political and economic cost that he will not want to pay, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
The global left must be unwavering in it is support for Venezuela as Washington increases its aggression, and clear-eyed about the West’s cynical motives for targeting it, says CLAUDIA WEBBE


