The Vice-minister for North America of the People’s Power Ministry for Foreign Relations, Carlos Ron, said on Thursday how important it is for the Venezuelan people to know the real effects of unilateral coercive measures by the United States against the country, which hinder medical-health care in the midst of the pandemic by COVID-19.
During the ‘Coffee in the Morning’ program on Venezuelan Television (VTV), the Vice-minister explained the efforts of the Bolivarian Government through international solidarity to “evade the blockade.”
“Buying medical supplies, protective equipment for health workers, or specific medicines, is much more difficult for us than for other countries due to these coercive measures (…) there are companies that do not want to sell to the country simply because they fear for the United States to retaliate against them (…) or when we get them to sell us the supplies, they do so at a higher price”, said Vice-minister Ron.
On that, he said that if it were not for the international solidarity and donation of supplies of countries such as China, Russia, or Cuba with which cooperation channels have been consolidated, Venezuela would be facing a real health crisis, due to the impact of the sanctions.
Citgo and the blatant theft of Venezuelan assets
Regarding the illegal appropriation of the oil company Citgo, the Vice-minister for North America explained that after the United States took control of the company -based on an executive order of August 2019- a kind of theft of Venezuelan assets was established and therefore, of the company.
“They gave control of Citgo to the phantom government that they recognize headed by Guaidó (…) and what happened a few days ago was that a Tribunal decided in the District Court of Delaware to approve the permits to initiate a process for the sale of Citgo for the payment of a lawsuit that the Canadian mining company Cristalex has against the Republic”.
Illegal retention of Venezuelan gold at the Bank of England
During the interview, the Vice-minister for North America stated that the illegal retention of Venezuelan gold in the Bank of England occurs in a broader context, which must be seen with much more care.
“The interest of the United States and its allies is to dismantle the Republic, dismantle our wealth. Just as they want to take Citgo, they have somehow put their hands on gold”.
On that, he pointed out that Venezuela spoke with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in order to carry out transactions with that gold -retained in England-, and make the purchases of medicines and necessary supplies in the framework of the pandemic and the Bank refused to make the delivery alleging that they do not recognize the current Government.
“It is yet another attempted robbery, they do not care about legality (…) they steal Citgo, they steal gold and they do not care much about what is going to happen to the Venezuelan people (…) all of this is part of a farce that aims to overthrow President Nicolás Maduro and keep all the riches of Venezuela”, said the Vice-minister ending the interview.