Caracas Chronicles

• A week ago, Vice president Delcy Rodríguez said before the United Nations that there are no restrictions for journalism in Venezuela. She didn’t say, though, that destroying the media system has been one of chavismo’s projects since they came to power. 
  • Yesterday morning, websites like Efecto Cocuyo, Crónica Uno and EVTV Miami were blocked by CONATEL, as NGO VE sin Filtro confirmed. It was a DNS block and they were applied by main internet providers CANTV, Movistar, Digitel, Supercable, and Inter. 
  • Efecto Cocuyo had already been blocked by CANTV, EVTV had already reported evtvmiami.com was blocked. Crónica Uno hadn’t been blocked so far. 
  • Private Internet providers must comply with censorship instructions by CONATEL. 

• TSJ president Maikel Moreno determined deputy Taína González is responsible for drug trafficking and organized crime. 
• ANC-imposed comptroller Elvis Amoroso handed reform projects on the anti-corruption and fiscal control laws to Nicolás’s National Assembly (AN), in order to “strengthen the government’s efforts against corruption.” 

A week ago, the National Assembly approved an agreement to support criminal action against Juan Guaidó. José Brito tweeted that the investigation against Guaidó and deputies of the 2015 Assembly is done and that they’ll give their report to the current Assembly. 

• CEOFANB commander Domingo Hernández Lárez reported that they managed to disarm explosives installed by guerrillas on the border. He didn’t say which states or what types of explosives they found. Two farmers died in Apure in landmine explosions that should have been deactivated in cooperation with the UN in 2021. 
• The Assembly appointed ten members of the Judicial Nominations Committee, which will elect the candidates that could become the TSJ justices. Most of them have ties with the regime. 
• After almost three years, the case against journalist and human rights activist Luis Carlos Díaz was archived, suspending the investigation unless new elements for conviction arise. NGO Espacio Público reported that judge Vanerkis Marquez also lifted measures of coercion, including the prohibition to leave the country and make public statements about his case. 
• The IACHR condemned 27 extrajudicial executions of impoverished Venezuelans during the first 15 days of the year and exhorted the regime to “investigate, judge and sanction” these crimes. 
• The National Federation of Health Union demanded the regime raise their wages to one petro, around 60 dollars. 

In Amazonas, chavismo installed a special commission to investigate crimes against Venezuelan migrants. 

• Interior minister Remigio Ceballos reported that the Cine Citta fire in Bello Monte started because of an “accumulation of hydrocarbons and defects of the fire suppression system” and that authorities are investigating to establish responsibilities. Firemen said that the store violated safety rules for handling fuels. Baruta mayor Darwin González recorded his conversation owners of the Riverside building, where he acted like a spokesperson for the store. He later tweeted that the owners of the store were going to pay for the damages. He didn’t say anything about the mayorship’s responsibility in the matter. 
• Bloomberg reported that PDVSA received the first shipment of the year: two million barrels of condensed oil from Iran, the key to increasing production. Oil tanker Stharla wasn’t registered or recorded to ever have been at the Jose port. 
• Nueva Esparta Nutritionists Guild warned that low protein intake is keeping their youth in malnourishment and calculated food insecurity in the region to be 90%. It’s 93% in the rest of the country. 
• BCV injected 75 million dollars into the economy to keep the dollar exchange rate low. 
• U.S. Press Secretary Jen Psaki confirmed Venezuelans who entered the country illegally are being deported to Colombia. Colombian foreign minister Marta Lucía Ramírez denied having signed an agreement with the U.S. to receive deported Venezuelans. The Venezuelan Embassy in the U.S. said it hasn’t authorized deportations. 
• The AN Delegate Commission asked the international community for more forceful actions against the Venezuelan regime causing instability and chaos and undermining the region’s democracies’ institutionality. 
• Chile’s President-Elect Gabriel Boric said that the situation of Venezuela is impacted by “the siege by the U.S., but there’s also enormous setbacks in the democratic conditions which have been brutal, not to mention the economic conditions, the 6-million-people exodus is the most important proof,” so he asked to build a democratic left.