EU member states cannot accept as legitimate the re-election of Nicolás Maduro as president of Venezuela, said the EU's high representative for foreign policy, Josep Borrell, quoted by Reuters and BTA.
Although Maduro will remain “de facto“ president of the South American country, he “does not have the democratic legitimacy of a president,” said Josep Borrell at a press conference after the informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels.
Venezuela's Supreme Court ruled last week that current head of state Nicolás Maduro won the July 28 presidential election, but countries including the United States, Peru, Argentina, Ecuador, Panama, Uruguay and Costa Rica say the results are a fluke of fraud and that opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez is the real winner.
On Sunday, Borrell issued a statement on behalf of the EU calling on Venezuelan authorities to publish polling station protocols that could be used to verify the results. After today's meeting in Brussels, Borrell said that “there is no hope” Maduro to publish the minutes and it is “too late to proceed with this request”.
„Since there are no protocols, there is no verification and we fear that there never will be. We cannot accept the legitimacy of Maduro as an elected president,”, said Josep Borrell, quoted by Reuters.
He explained later that this did not mean severing diplomatic relations with the Venezuelan government. As an example, Borrell pointed out that the EU maintains relations with the Sandinista regime of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua.
„We do not accept democratic legitimacy based on results that cannot be verified,” Borrell said.
Earlier this month, a UN report revealed that at least 1,260 people have been detained and 23 killed in Venezuela since the election “in severe state repression”.
Maduro himself admitted on August 3 that 2,000 people had been detained and would be punished. “This time there will be no forgiveness,” he told his supporters.
In addition to Venezuela, EU foreign affairs ministers also discussed today the situation in Ukraine and the surprising Ukrainian operation in the Kursk region.
„Ukraine's counteroffensive operation in Kursk dealt a blow to Putin's narrative,” said Josep Borrell.
He also warned that Russia is trying to disable Ukraine's energy system and “leave all of Ukraine in the dark and cold this winter”.
Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba also attended the meeting. He called on the Allies to speed up the delivery of the promised air defense systems.