Venezuelan parliament approved a measure that leaves the door open for military intervention

Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó has taken another step in his attempt to expel President Nicolás Maduro from power: on Tuesday, he obtained the support of the Venezuelan Parliament for regional defense treaty this would protect a possible military intervention.

Guaidó marked the six months of his self-proclamation as the country's responsible president, with the recognition of fifty nations, including the United States, which does not exclude a action army bring out Maduro.

"Unanimously approved by all present, it is thus sanctioned (the law)" which re-establishes Venezuela in the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (Rio Treaty), said Guaido during a legislative session on a square in Caracas.

"¡If we can! ", hundreds of supporters have celebrated the decision of the majority of the opposition.Venezuela had withdrawn from the agreement in 2013.

"The TIAR is not magicalit is not a button that we support and tomorrow everything is resolved, "said the opponent.

Guaidó said that this step will allow the establishment of "international alliances" for "defend the people and Venezuelan sovereignty ", without explicitly mentioning foreign intervention.

But do not exclude this option to end the "Maduro's dictatorship", to whom the legislator has declared in" the usurpation "of the power to consider that his reelection in 2018 was fraudulent.But the lack of recognition is partial He declared it in defiance of 2016.

"We are not afraid in any space, as long as it puts an end to the suffering of our people, "he said on Tuesday.

A threat?

Adopted in 1947 in the middle of the cold war, the TIAR indicates in its article 3 that an armed attack against an American State, by another country, will be considered as an aggression against all its members, who engage to deal with it jointly.

"This is not the case in Venezuela," he told reporters. AFP the internationalist Mariano de Alba, indicating that "the scenario that would apply would be that of Article 6"that in a country a situation arises "threatens the peace of the continent".

Washington, which considers Venezuela as "unusual and extraordinary threat"for your safety, he declares that Hezbollah He is active in Venezuela, while Bogotá and Guaido himself accuse Maduro of harboring guerrillas of the National Liberation Army (ELN).

In addition to the United States and Colombia, the agreement includes countries such as Brazil, Argentina and Peru, Maduro's reviews, supported by China, Russia, Iran and Turkey.

The treaty also provides for rupture of the relationship diplomatic and economic, even maritime, observes De Alba.

To formalize the refund, Guaidó must communicate the decision to the Organization of American States (OAS), who recognizes him as president in charge.

In any case, the willingness to intervene militarily outside its borders corresponds to each country, according to De Alba.

"There is no interest in a military intervention in the hemisphere The United States knows that they can not take this approach without being part of a coalition, "he told the AFP Michael Shifter, Inter-American Dialogue.

Internal pressure

The return to the TIAR is announced at a time when the government and the opposition are negotiating a way out of the crisis by Norway. Guaidó is seeking to "increase the pressure for negotiations to progress," de Alba said.

Moreover, the opponent has seen his appeal power drop and is facing pressure from a sector of the opposition asks for more aggression.

"It is also a strategy of revitalizing the public of the opposition," observes the political scientist Ricardo Sucre.

The departure of the TIAR was approved in 2012 by Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Venezuela, who claimed that the pact had lost its significance after the conflict of the 1982 war. between Argentina and Great Britain for the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands, when the United States did not support Buenos Aires.