A denialist position on human rights violations in Venezuela

Converted into a true lawyer for the Chavist regime, the national government has decided to withdraw the lawsuit brought by Argentina alongside Canada, Chile, Colombia and Paraguay in 2018 against the Nicolás Maduro regime before the International Criminal Court ( ICC) for serious violations. human rights in Venezuela.

But despite the fact that systematic human rights violations in Venezuela have increased, Argentina’s highest authorities have chosen to drop the claim to the validity of the same in that country. The measure was implemented by the Argentine Embassy in the Netherlands to the Hague-based agency on March 24, when the government announced Argentina’s withdrawal from the Lima group.

Unfortunately, this attitude of Argentine diplomacy is not new. Since December 2019, the government has taken every opportunity presented to it to endorse the Chavista regime.

Just days after taking power, the new administration ignored the authorities of the Venezuelan National Assembly and withdrew its recognition from Ambassador Elisa Trotta, representative in Argentina. While in June 2020, during a conference with the former president of Brazil Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the Argentinian head of state surprised by saying that several South American leaders registered in the 21st century socialism like Evo Morales, Rafael Correa and Hugo Chávez Frías himself.

In September 2020, the Argentine Ambassador to the Organization of American States (OAS) explained that, according to the ruling party, there is “a biased view of the violation of human rights in many countries. “of the region and considered that the Venezuelan regime was subjected to an” arbitrary international pressure “.

And in December of that year, the Argentinian executive supported the regime by sending a representative to the swearing-in of the legislative authorities following a fraudulent and flawed electoral process carried out on the 6 of that month in what was a veritable “sham.” “electoral perpetrated. to dedicate addicted representatives to the occupants of the Miraflores Palace.

But all of these measures can only be interpreted as a deliberate foreign policy that puts Argentina at the service of the Chavist dictatorship. In doing so, the grotesque violations of individual freedoms in Venezuela are ignored, adopting a genuine negationist attitude in the face of the very serious human rights violations taking place in this country.

Once again, the Argentine authorities have chosen to depart from our country’s traditional adherence to the ideals of democracy and respect for human rights, two fundamental pillars of our constitutional system. This reality has distanced us from our South American neighbors who maintain the claim of the high and inalienable values ​​for which so many compatriots fought during years of dictatorships.

The attitude of the government, in turn, involves a slap in the face to the thousands of Venezuelans who suffer imprisonment, torture and executions as well as the hundreds or thousands of citizens of this country who had to live the traumatic experience of exile and came to Argentina in search of a better future.

The sad recent history of our country has taught us the aberrant consequences that can arise after the interruption of the constitutional order and its replacement by a dictatorial regime. But in the Americas in the 21st century, democracies are often not replaced by traditional coups. Nowadays, democracies are generally dismantled from within, by the suppression, one by one, of each institution of the Republic.

The Venezuela of the last twenty years is a finished case of this phenomenon. This took place after the arrival of an elected government with undeniable origin legitimacy but which soon after began to erode the country’s institutions to the point of causing real regime change. Thus, after being democratically elected president of Venezuela in 1998, Hugo Chávez Frías swore to a “dying” constitution and almost immediately launched a series of reforms that in fact transformed the country, making this democracy a sort of quasi-state. – failed our day. A report by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, documents torture, killings and political prisoners in this country.

During the last military dictatorship (1976-1983), many Argentines found refuge in the democratic Venezuela of those years. It was a time when almost every country in the region was dominated by de facto governments. At the time, Venezuela was one of the very few countries to escape this rule – two more were Colombia and Costa Rica – and it had made it a beacon of freedom for the Americas. In homage to this people, subjected for two decades to an increasingly despotic regime, we must raise our voices in the face of any outrage against freedom.

In terms of human rights, there is no room for double talk or underhanded attitudes. You are on the side of human rights or you are on the side of dictatorships. It is unacceptable how, once again, the Argentine government has chosen to place itself in the position of advocate for human rights violators.

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