How to save Venezuela

Justin Trudeau’s top diplomat is visiting Havana again, hoping to enlist Cuba’s help in resolving the political and humanitarian crisis in Venezuela, Bloomberg reports:

Wednesday’s trip to the island by Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland marks the third round of face-to-face talks with her Cuban counterpart since Canada began pushing, in concert with the U.S. and a group of Latin American nations, for Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro to cede power.

Her visit coincided with an announcement by Secretary of State Michael Pompeo that the United States has opened an interim diplomatic Venezuela office in Colombia amid internal conflict over Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s attempts to remain in power, The Hill reports:

Pompeo said Charge d’Affaires James Story will oversee the Venezuela Affairs Unit (VAU), which is located at the U.S. Embassy in Bogota‎, Colombia….. A leaked recording in June captured Pompeo admitting that keeping the opposition forces united in their fight had been “devilishly difficult.”

CHILE – APRIL 25: Andres Velasco, Chilean minister of Finance, arrives for the World Economic Forum on Latin America in Santiago, Chile, Wednesday, April 25, 2007. (Photo by Morten Andersen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Venezuela was once the pride and democratic example of Latin America. It can be that once again: a free, stable, and productive country, where citizens live in safety and peace – but only if the international community provides support in at least three key areas, argues Andrés Velasco (right), a former presidential candidate and finance minister of Chile, and Dean of the School of Public Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

• First, it should immediately recognize the need for large debt reduction, rather than attempting to postpone the inevitable for years.
• Second, the IMF and the other multilaterals will have to provide emergency balance-of-payments support.
• And, third, grants will be needed to meet urgent humanitarian needs and to prevent foreign debt from building up too fast once again.

But none of this can happen unless and until Venezuela gets a new, legitimate government with full control of the situation on the ground, he writes for Project Syndicate:

Dialogue will indeed be necessary to end the Venezuelan catastrophe. But the international community should not make the mistake of treating talks as a meeting of two parties of good will in need of friendly encouragement to subordinate their differences. Maduro heads a dictatorial regime that inflicts violence and suffering on a daily basis. The representatives of the National Assembly – Guaidó’s camp – are democratically elected officials who have been on the receiving end of that violence. Talks will not bear fruit unless the world’s democracies apply maximum diplomatic pressure on Maduro.

The recent revelation – confirmed by US and Venezuelan officials – that high-level contacts have been taking place behind closed doors suggests that international pressure is beginning to yield results, adds Velasco.