Venezuela is in the hands of gangsters

A brutal dictatorship

 Venezuelans living in the country are suffering a significant decline in their quality of life but it takes Venezuelans living abroad and returning for brief visits to appreciate the tragic extent of national decay. Living in reasonably stable societies they return to Venezuela to find chaos, filth and an atmosphere of general deterioration, which contrasts greatly with the country they remember.   

The destruction of Venezuela at the hands of a gang of ideological fanatics, which came to power in 1999, will be seen, in historical perspective, as one of the major Latin American tragedies of our times. It has been taking place before the uncomprehending, indifferent or, even, complacent eyes of a majority of the political leadership in the region. From the ineffective Organization of American States, OAS, to the redundant Union of South American Countries, UNASUR and from the parasitic  Bolivarian Alliance for the peoples of Our America, ALBA, to the Petroleum Alliance of Caribbean States, PETROCARIBE, Venezuelan oil money has been prodigally distributed by the gangsters in power  to convert Secretary Generals and Heads of State into passive witnesses or, worse, silent accomplices of the enormous crimes being committed in the country. Utilizing a hypocritical , pseudo-democratic rhetoric,  leaders such as Insulza (OAS), Samper( UNASUR),  Presidents or former Presidents Ortega, Correa and Morales (members of ALBA),  Lula and Roussef (Brazil), Mujica (Uruguay), Fernandez and Kirchner (Argentina), Fernandez (Dominican Republic), Zelaya (Honduras) and, even, Santos (Colombia)  have  seen with tolerance the death of democracy and freedom in Venezuela.

In spite of knowing - who could ignore it? -  the repressive and abusive nature of the regime they have been complacent or, even, openly supportive of the manner Venezuelan citizens have been victimized. These leaders have failed the cause of democracy in the hemisphere by choosing convenience and self-interest over principles.     

The main leaders of the Venezuelan democratic opposition are either in prison or accused of absurd crimes by a puppet judicial system, including a Supreme Tribunal of Justice that has never decided against the government of the last 15 years and the three members of a so-called Moral Power who merely serve as bodyguards for the members of the regime. A fabricated case of attempted magnicide is being brought against a group of opposition leaders, including the courageous Maria Corina Machado. Leopoldo Lopez is still in prison in spite of the repeated demands by the United Nations to set him free. Judge Affiuni, put in prison by the direct orders of the deceased President Chavez, now at   home by medical reasons, is being sent back to prison, where she was raped. The members of the government  do no longer camouflage their impunity. Pedro Carreño, a member of the National Assembly and one of the most corrupt members of the gang says, about the accusation being brought against  Mrs. Machado: “this criminal will get a fair trial”, which amounts to a guilty verdict before the trial even starts.

The extent of the crimes committed by the gangsters ruling Venezuela with the support of the military, including several generals and other high ranking officers who have  been listed by the U.S. government as related to drug trafficking, has to be known by the outside world. And the degree of complicity of the so-called democratic political leadership of Latin America should be exposed as one of the most tragic events in the modern history of our hemisphere.