Foto: AP |
THE EPIC
political and humanitarian crisis in Venezuela is due to pass a new juncture
Thursday when President Nicolás Maduro is sworn in for a second six-year term.
His first saw an implosion unprecedented in modern Latin American history:
Though his country was not at war, its economy shrank by 50 percent. What was
once the region’s richest society was swept by epidemics of malnutrition,
preventable diseases and violent crime. Three million people fled the country.
Yet Mr. Maduro, having orchestrated a fraudulent reelection, presses on with
what the regime describes as a socialist revolution, with tutoring from Cuba
and predatory loans from Russia and China.
If there is
any light in this bleak picture, it is that Venezuela’s neighbors are edging
toward more assertive action to stem a crisis that, with the massive flow of
refugees, threatens to destabilize several other countries. Last week, 13
governments, including Brazil, Colombia, Argentina and Canada, issued a
statement declaring Mr. Maduro’s presidency illegitimate and threatening
sanctions. Peru imposed travel and banking restrictions on Mr. Maduro and his
cabinet, and several countries said they would recognize the
opposition-controlled National Assembly as Venezuela’s only legitimate
institution.
Unfortunately,
that is unlikely to move the regime. Mr. Maduro has already survived challenges
that usually topple governments, including months of mass street protests in
2017 and inflation that soared to 1 million percent last year. That’s partly
because critical shortages of food, water, medicine and power have kept many
Venezuelans preoccupied with day-to-day survival, while the availability of
refuge in neighboring countries has provided an escape valve. But Mr. Maduro,
like Hugo Chávez before him, has not hesitated to employ crude repression. A
report issued Wednesday by Human Rights Watch said it had documented 380 cases
of cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of government opponents since 2014,
including at least 31 cases of torture. That includes dozens of military
personnel suspected of coup-plotting.
Like three
administrations before it, the Trump White House has struggled over how to
respond to the Chavistas. The Treasury Department has steadily expanded
sanctions, which now apply to some 70 people and cut off Venezuela’s access to
U.S. banks. But though President Trump has sometimes talked of military
intervention, he has rightly refrained from that, as well as from lesser
measures, such as a boycott of Venezuelan oil. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
has been urging Latin American governments to act, but not all are cooperating.
Mexico, under its new leftist president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, declined
to join the collective condemnation of Mr. Maduro and is sending a diplomat to
his inauguration.
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