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Carmelina Ramirez Rodriguez Special Correspondent
History will judge severely a new imperialist military intervention in the region and the complicity of those who irresponsibly accompany it.

During last month, Venezuela has occupied the attention of the main international Press, which has intended to present us an apocalyptic version of that country’s political, economic and humanitarian crisis.

In Venezuela, there is no humanitarian crisis.

Venezuela is facing economic problems largely due to the sanctions, the blockade and other hostile actions promoted by the United States, with the complicity of some Latin American governments.

Media and political analysts, even in the US, have revealed that extremist figures of that government with a long history of actions and slander aimed at causing or instigating wars, such as John Bolton, the US national security advisor and Mauricio Claver-Carone, a director of the National Security Council’s Office of Western Hemisphere Affairs.

In collusion with Marco Rubio, senator of the anti-Cuban mafia of Florida, they designed, directly and thoroughly organised and obtained the funds, from their posts in Washington, for the attempted coup d’ etat in Venezuela by means of the illegal self-proclamation of a president.

They are the same culprits who, either personally or through the State Department, have been putting brutal pressures on numerous governments to force them to support the arbitrary call for new presidential elections in Venezuela, while promoting recognition for the usurper who hardly earned 97 000 votes as a parliamentarian, against the more than 6 million Venezuelans who elected constitutional President Nicolás Maduro Moros last May.

After the resistance put up by the Bolivarian and Chavista people against the coup, evidenced by the mass demonstrations in support of President Maduro and the loyalty of the National Bolivarian Armed Forces, the US government has intensified its international political and media campaign and strengthened unilateral economic coercive measures against Venezuela, among them the blocking of Venezuelan funds in third country banks which hold billions of dollars.

The theft of the oil revenues of that sister nation is causing this grave humanitarian damage and harsh deprivation of its people.

In addition to this cruel and unjustifiable plunder, the US intends to fabricate a humanitarian pretext in order to launch a military offensive against Venezuela.

Washington is also seeking to introduce in the territory of that sovereign nation, by resorting to intimidation, pressures and force, an alleged humanitarian aid which is one thousand times inferior compared to the economic damage caused by the US blockade.

The usurper and self-proclaimed “president” shamelessly announced his disposition to call for a US military intervention under the pretext of receiving the aforementioned “humanitarian aid.”

He has described the sovereign and proud rejection of that manoeuvre as a “crime against humanity.”

US officials have been arrogantly and blatantly reminding us all, day in, day out, that when it comes to Venezuela: “all options are on the table, including military action.”

In the process of fabricating pretexts, the US government has resorted to deception and slander.

It has presented a draft resolution at the UN Security Council which, cynically and hypocritically expresses deep concern about “the deteriorating human rights and humanitarian situation, the recent attempts to block the delivery of humanitarian aid, the millions of Venezuelan refugees and migrants, the excessive use of force against peaceful protesters, the breakdown of regional peace and security in Venezuela,” and call “to take the necessary steps.”

It is obvious that the United States is paving the way to forcibly establish “a humanitarian corridor” under “international supervision”, invoke “the obligation to protect” civilians and take “all necessary steps”. It is worth recalling that similar behaviour and pretexts were resorted to by the US during the prelude to the wars it launched against Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya, which resulted in tremendous human losses and caused enormous suffering.

The US government attempts to remove the biggest obstacle — the Bolivarian and Chavista Revolution— to the imperialist domination of Our America and deprive the Venezuelan people from the largest certified oil reserve of the planet and numerous strategic natural resources.

It would be impossible to forget the sad and painful history of US military interventions perpetrated more than once in Mexico, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, Honduras, and most recently Grenada and Panama.

What is at stake today in Venezuela is the sovereignty and dignity of Latin America and the Caribbean and the peoples of the South.

Equally at stake is the survival of the rules of International Law and the UN Charter.

What is being defined today is whether the legitimacy of a government emanates from the express and sovereign will of its people or from the recognition of foreign powers.

The revolutionary government of Cuba calls for an international mobilisation in defence of peace in Venezuela and the region, based on the principles enshrined in the Proclamation of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace, which was adopted by the Heads of State and Government of Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) in 2014.

Carmelina Ramirez Rodriguez is the Cuban Ambassador to Zimbabwe.