Venezuelan opposition split over change of tack

Cracks showed openly in Venezuela’s opposition alliance on Thursday as President Nicolas Maduro reached out to the US.

Come Venezuela (VV) leader Maria Corina Machado attacked the the decision by the majority of parties in the Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD) coalition to stand in December’s regional elections.

The Mud boycotted the July 30 elections to the new National Constituent Assembly called by Mr Maduro in may, but 8.1 million voters turned out despite opposition riots and attacks on polling stations that left six dead.

But last week the second-largest MUD party, Democratic Action, announced it would stand candidates separately.

Ms Machado wrote on Twitter: “Today VV deviates from the route chosen by the Mud,” calling it “surrender.”

“While the Mud follows this route, VV will not be part of the coalition,” she said, demanding it press on with the four moths of regime-change riots that have left 124 dead.

“For Maduro to stay until December? No. we cannot accept it,” Ms Machado wrote.

“We are consistent with what we have promised the country, which was to struggle for the exit.”

“To have a governorship or mayorship under a dictatorship is useless,” she insisted. “After the fraud of July 30 it is inconceivable to even think of going to carnival queen elections.”

Ms Machado was a founding member and president of Sumate (Join Up), which organised the failed 2004 recall referendum against late president Hugo Chavez with funds from the US State Department’s National Endowment for Democracy.

Her signature was one of 352 on the decree suspending parliament and declaring Pedro Carmona president during the short-lived April 2002 coup against Mr Chavez.

Meanwhile Mr Maduro called for a summit of leaders of Latin American nations to find a solution to the crisis.

“Respect is the only path to peace, not threats or violence or the economic and commercial blockade," he said.

Mr Maduro also offered "mutually respectful" dialogue with the US when he visits New York next month for the UN General Assembly.

"Mr Donald Trump, here is my hand," he said.

Also on Thursday the Credit Suisse bank banned trading in venezuelan government bonds over "recent development and the political climate" there.

Any future transactions involving Venezuelan officials or assets will have to go through additional screening, according to a leaked memo.

So far the Trump administration has only levelled individual sanctions on Mr Maduro, Vice-President Tarek el-Aissami, National Electoral Council president Tibisay Lucena and some other officials.

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