U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States has ‘serious concerns’ about the announced result of Venezuela’s hotly contested presidential election that authorities say was won by incumbent Nicolas Maduro.

Speaking in Tokyo on Monday shortly after the announcement was made, Blinken said the U.S. was concerned that the result reflected neither the will nor the votes of the Venezuelan people. He called for election officials to publish the full results transparently and immediately and said the U.S. and the international community would respond accordingly.

  • @[email protected]
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    4 months ago

    Venezuelan oil is rich in sulphur, so it is less attractive. It requires special infrastructure and buyers who have the installed capacity to deal with heavy crudes, like China and India.

    PS: funnily enough, Guyana’s crude is from a different geological segment and of higher quality and highly valuable, no wonder Maduro wants to annex it.

    • @UnderpantsWeevil
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      4 months ago

      Guyana’s crude is from a different geological segment and of higher quality and highly valuable

      The US couped Guyana back in the 60s and never let the country out from under its boot heel.

      • @NOT_RICK
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        134 months ago

        That’s an extremely flimsy claim given the PPP, an explicitly Marxist party, has held power in Guyana multiple times including this exact moment. I guess socialist solidarity ends when there are resources to extract?

        And yes I am aware the party just removed ML and socialism from their constitution but that hardly makes them US stooges.

        • @UnderpantsWeevil
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          34 months ago

          PPP, an explicitly Marxist party, has held power in Guyana multiple times

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irfaan_Ali#Candidacy

          Immediately following his selection, Ali was accused of academic fraud, with opponents claiming that when Ali was in his early 20s, he had misrepresented one of his qualifications. Ali was also indicted on 19 charges of other fraud for allegedly defrauding the state of over $174M between 2011 and 2015, allegedly conspiring with persons unknown to “greatly undersell” 19 plots of state lands at Plantation Sparendaam and Goedverwagting in Demerara-Mahaica to current or former government officials.

          The trial on the matters was postponed several times. He was granted self bail on the charges. The lands, which were sold for $39.8M, are valued at $212.4M, according to the Special Organized Crime Unit (SOCU). On 14 August, the charges were dismissed.

          Explicitly Marxist guy who privatizes state lands to his business buddies for a fifth their asking price. Sounds very Marxist.

          • @NOT_RICK
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            94 months ago

            And yet he’s still a leader of the party that Kennedy tried to sideline in the coup you mentioned. He’s hardly the first person to sell out for personal gain.

            • @UnderpantsWeevil
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              24 months ago

              A party that’s been hollowed out by corruption. It’s no more the Party of Marxism than the American Republican Party is the Party of Lincoln.

              • @NOT_RICK
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                44 months ago

                I don’t disagree. It also fittingly applies to PSUV

      • @[email protected]
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        4 months ago

        Great, even if true, let’s start an international war to fix it, right Sr. Maduro?

        • @UnderpantsWeevil
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          -44 months ago

          One man’s illegal invasion is another man’s democratic liberation. But this whole thing reeks of the Iraq/Kuwait conflict of '91, complete with arguments over who owns which oil field and shady corporate executives leaning on domestic news media to get people’s hate up.

          • @[email protected]
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            4 months ago

            No, no it isn’t, Saddam invaded Kuwait to annex it. Let’s hope Maduro does not try to invade Guyana to annex it.

            • @UnderpantsWeevil
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              -54 months ago

              Saddam invaded Kuwait to annex it

              Saddam invaded Kuwait to halt their slant drilling project into the transboundary Rumaila oil field.

              • @[email protected]
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                24 months ago

                Even if that were the only reason, that has no relation to Guyana, because these are geologically independent reservoirs.

              • @[email protected]
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                24 months ago

                And also because Kuwait was the only party involved that refused some debt forgiveness for Iraq’s losses in the Iran/Iraq war backed by the US and its allies.