BUENOS AIRES- President Javier Milei said on Friday that Argentina supports Venezuelans “in this fight for freedom,” in a message sent to opposition leader María Corina Machado and Edmundo González Urrieta, two days before the presidential elections in Venezuela.
Argentina also expressed its desire that Venezuela “respect the right of its citizens to vote and repudiates the regime’s decision to prevent” former Argentine President Alberto Fernández (2019-2023) from participating as an observer of the elections, in the words of presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni.
Bilateral support
María Corina Machado wrote on her X network account that she had a conversation with Milei, who is in Paris to attend the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games.
“I had a pleasant conversation today with Javier Milei, President of Argentina, whom I thanked for the support and commitment of his government and the political team of the Foreign Ministry during these difficult months for Venezuelans and for our people in the campaign teams,” Machado wrote.
The Argentine president responded to Machado also on X and said: “We will always be with the Venezuelan people in this fight for freedom.”
Earlier, Adorni had expressed his hope that “the right to vote in Venezuela will be respected on Sunday.”
“We understand that Venezuelans are getting closer to regaining full democracy,” he said at a press conference.
He also expressed his “astonishment and dismay at the regime’s decision to prevent former President Alberto Fernández from participating as an international observer of the electoral process.”
Refusal of Chavismo
Alberto Fernández said on Wednesday that the regime asked him to travel to Venezuela to participate in the mission of international observers of the elections in that country because it had “doubts about (his) impartiality.”
“He was denied entry into the country simply for saying that if the government is eventually defeated, he must accept the popular verdict,” Adorni said.
Venezuelan elections will be held on Sunday, in which Nicolás Maduro, the candidate of the ruling Chavista party, finds his main rival in Edmundo González Urrutia.
Urrutia has the support of María Corina Machado, the favourite in the polls but politically disqualified by a Chavista organisation from holding public office.
Source: With information from AFP