Caracas Chronicles

• Feminist organizations participated in the 181st session of the IACHR, where they denounced the situation of women and girls, which has gotten worse because of the complex humanitarian emergency and the political crisis. 
  • The State doesn’t guarantee their rights to health, education, food, or justice; no public policy to improve their situation and the political decision to not release figures only worsens impunity. 
  • From January to September this year, CEPAZ has registered 207 femicides and 41 attempts of femicide. 
  • The rates of unwanted pregnancies increased, unsafe abortions and death of mothers have increased and 90% of women can’t access family planning methods. 
  • The activists requested that the Mecanismo de Seguimiento sobre Venezuela opens a chapter on gender issues and that the IACHR should work with the UN and the Committee for Eradicating Discrimination Against Women, and they called on the State to stop harassing people who denounce violations and defend women’s rights. 

• An OPEC report showed us the figures that PDVSA has been unwilling to publish since 2016. 
  • In 2020, Venezuela made 7,690 million dollars in oil revenue, a drop of 57% compared to 2018 and 91% compared to 2012. 
  • Venezuela produced 57,000 bpd in 2020, 69% less than in 2019 and 86% less than in 2010. This amount doesn’t cover internal demand, which is 119,000 bpd. 
  • PDVSA’s main clients are China, India and “other Asian countries.” 
  • In 2020, we exported 486,800 bpd, a drop of 42% compared to 2019 and 75% compared to 2015. 

Alex Saab will plead not guilty of money laundering on Monday, said his lawyer Henry Bell. 

• Deputy Bibiana Lucas presented the report on the Monómeros investigation. Lucas assured that there’s enough evidence to say that former employers created a conspiracy to cause the bankruptcy, which would make the takeover by creditor Nitron Group easier. She insisted that individuals, and not the Colombian government, are at fault. “Monómeros isn’t bankrupt, it never has been bankrupt,” she said and added that everything must change. The commission recommended starting a process to determine the political responsibility of these individuals, and she mentioned Jorge Pacheco and Carmen Elisa Hernández. PJ, AD and UNT approved the report but VP and the 16J faction refrained since they thought the report was “insufficient”. Guaidó wrote that “the investigation must continue and go into detail until we find who’s responsible.” The commission asked Guaidó to call for an extraordinary session, to present the report and make it public. 
• The EU electoral observation mission deployed 44 observers in 22 states in the country. The head of the delegation, Isabel Santos, assured that the mission is “independent, impartial and neutral.” Santos already met with CNE president Pedro Calzadilla. 
• CNE board member Enrique Márquez assured the mission can’t complain about irregularities during the process, they can just present reports of what they see. “There’s only one referee, the CNE. International observers aren’t referees,” he said. 
•  PSUV started the campaign with an event with governor Héctor Rodríguez and the speaker of Maduro’s Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez. They used dozens of public buses to move their audience. 
• The hearing of FundaRedes activists Javier Tarazona, Rafael Tarazona and Omar García was suspended without explanation. 
• Union leaders and family members of workers who have been arbitrarily detained protested in front of the EU office in Caracas to demand they include their release in negotiations. The protesters were threatened by SEBIN officers. 
• Médicos Unidos de Venezuela reported that 779 healthcare workers have died of COVID-19. 
• Associated Press published a piece saying that, in 2020, Maduro’s regime offered the release of CITGO executives and two American citizens captured in Operation Gedeón in exchange for the release of Alex Saab. The meeting took place in Mexico, between Jorge Rodríguez, Richard Grenell (an advisor to Trump), and the owner of Blackwater, Erik Prince, who was in Venezuela in 2019, when he met with Delcy Rodríguez.
• Spanish newspaper ABC reported that Audiencia Nacional judge Manuel García Castellón intends to subpoena the people who Hugo “El Pollo” Carvajal mentioned in his last hearing, including Podemos founders Juan Carlos Monedero and Carolina Bescansa,and professors Jorge Lago and Ariel Jerez. Alex Saab will plead not guilty of money laundering on Monday, said his lawyer Henry Bell. 
• Russia announced that their foreign minister Serguéi Lavrov will have a meeting on November 8th with Maduro’s foreign minister Félix Plasencia, to talk about “ways to contribute to a political solution for internal differences in Venezuela,” said spokeswoman María Zajárova.