Caracas Chronicles

• CNE president Pedro Calzadilla announced on Tuesday that they approved inscriptions of 20 new political parties for the elections in November, including the Mesa de Unidad Democrática (MUD). 
  • This opposition strategy gathered the main opposition parties in 2015 and was the most voted in the history of the country until it was eliminated with a Supreme Tribunal of Justice ruling in 2018. 
  • The fact that it’s being restored raises many questions. If it’s a result of negotiations, someone has to explain the conditions.
  • Calzadilla thinks this is “one more piece of evidence” of the Electoral Branch favoring restoring political rights and guarantees. 
  • Journalist Eugenio Martínez, who specializes in the electoral source, said that the promoting commission is responsible for the MUD political party. 

• Deputies of the 2015 National Assembly asked Colombia and other allies to activate agreements to protect people on the border from FARC and ELN activities. 
  • Deputy Romel Guzamana denounced the presence of around 1,5000 guerrillas in Indigenous territory. He said that Grupos Armados Organizados (GAO) are in 74 municipalities in Colombia and Venezuela. He said that Maduro’s regime allowed the criminal groups to take over this territory. 

• The most recent report by UCAB’s Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas y Sociales projects that economic activity will grow by 2% and hyperinflation will stay between 2,000% and 2,500%. 
  • Despite these figures, there is no good news because “the nature of the crisis and the structure of the production process doesn’t allow the high poverty levels to decrease, but deepen inequality.” They also estimated a small recovery of oil production. 

• William Gil, deputy to Maduro’s Assembly, assured on Tuesday that Venezuela doesn’t have water because of the sanctions and said that the new prices will be divided into “subsidized milliliters” and a new prize in dollars. 
• Zulia governor Omar Prieto announced that he’ll solve the problem of gas for dialysis patients and seniors. How? Controlling a gas station to “eliminate the black market.” 
• Deputy Ricardo Molina explained that the PSUV must wait for the results that its electoral commission will issue on nominations. He said that 14,300 UBCH certificates will be transcribed on a cell phone and taken to Caracas. 
• Latin America and the Caribbean, the region with the most cases and deaths of COVID-19, registered an average of 37 vaccine doses per 100 inhabitants. Chile and Uruguay are among the ten countries with the highest vaccination rate, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico and Peru are lagging behind and Venezuela isn’t even on the list because of opacity by the government. 
• Erickvaldo Márquez was released on Tuesday. He’s a student at the Universidad de Los Andes in Merida, who was accused without evidence of murdering a public officer. He was in jail for three years and seven months, even though a judge ordered he’d be released in December 2020, a prosecutor refused to do so. Months ago, he was taken in handcuffs to the university to defend his thesis. 
• It’s been two years since the death of Captain Rafael Acosta Arévalo. Human rights organizations asked the public to remember that he died in state custody, because of the torture he suffered at DGCIM cells. He was accused of treason, military rebellion and instigating to rebel. 
• Monitor Salud denounced the persecution and attempted detention of Razetti Hospital union leader Edinson Hernández in Anzoátegui: “We’ve come here to know what are the reasons to detain Edinson and we want to see the judge’s order. We want to know the reasons, the cause,” said the NGO. 
• Súmate asked the CNE to move the elections to December 5th and extend the period for new voters to register in the Electoral Registry.  A little under 257,000 new voters have registered so far. 
• The main water pipeline exploded in San Antonio de Los Altos (Miranda), so Hidrocapital suspended the service. They later suspended electricity and internet too and on Tuesday evening, there was a severe electricity failure in at least eight states. 
• Hundreds of Venezuelans will return from Trinidad and Tobago in July because of the high unemployment rates caused by the crisis during the pandemic. 
• The Canadian and Mexican Foreign ministers talked about the political and humanitarian crises in Venezuela and discussed cooperation to tackle regional challenges like migration and instability in Venezuela. 
• “The situation that Nicaragua is going through puts the international community to the test and we have to rise up to the challenge, providing an effective and real solution. We can’t allow another Venezuela, said Panamanian Foreign minister Erika Mouynes. 

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Cuban writer Delia Fiallo died at 96 years old. She’s known for writing important telenovelas like Cristal, Topacio and Kassandra.