Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro this week said he is issuing a decree to move Christmas to October amid widespread unrest and protests against July’s election.
Over the past month, tensions have escalated in the country in the fallout of a highly contested presidential election that the U.S. State Department said was not credible. Both Maduro and his opponents have declared victory, causing protests to erupt.
As political tensions escalate, Maduro has decided that Christmas should come nearly three months earlier than usual.
It’s not the first time that Maduro, head of the Socialist Party of Venezuela, has declared that Christmas would come early. He made a similar move during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Electoral authorities backed by the ruling party declared Maduro the winner of the July 28 election without showing any detailed results to back up their claim as they did in previous presidential elections.
The U.S. State Department said that the declaration of Maduro’s electoral victory “came with no supporting evidence” and that it also found “overwhelming evidence ... that Edmundo González Urrutia won the most votes in Venezuela’s July 28 presidential election.”
Just hours before Maduro’s announcement about Christmas, a Venezuelan judge on Sept. 2 issued an arrest warrant for González, a former diplomat, accusing him of various crimes, including conspiracy, falsifying documents, and usurpation of powers.
U.S. National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters in Washington that the United States is concerned about the González arrest warrant and criticized Maduro for alleged attempts to keep himself in power.
“This is just another example of Mr. Maduro’s efforts to maintain power by force and to refuse to recognize that Mr. González won the most votes on the 28th of July,” he said.
Washington has already enforced a number of sanctions against Maduro, he said. Earlier this week, the U.S. government announced that it had seized a plane that was being used by Maduro, citing evasion of sanctions and violation of export laws.
A Dassault Falcon 900EX aircraft was seized in the Dominican Republic and taken to federal authorities in Florida, the U.S. Department of Justice announced in a statement. The aircraft was bought through a shell company and smuggled out of the United States, the department said.
Rights groups, meanwhile, have sounded the alarm that Venezuela is continuing a crackdown on dissent amid mass protests. In an analysis released on Sept. 4, Human Rights Watch said officials in the country have been carrying out “widespread human rights violations” against opposition leaders, demonstrators, and critics since the election.
So far, it said, at least 24 people have been killed during demonstrations, with most occurring on July 29 and 30. Several of Maduro’s security forces, including police bureaus, may have been responsible for “some killings,” although some pro-government armed groups “appear to be responsible” for some of the deaths, the rights group stated.In the meantime, Venezuela opposition leader María Corina Machado said that the international community, including the U.S. government, needs to take more action against Maduro amid the election dispute.
“I certainly think the United States should do much more and I have been very clear to them and to other countries,” Machado said at an online news conference on Sept. 5, adding that there were international mechanisms to punish those who violate human rights.
