Caracas Chronicles

• Vice president Delcy Rodríguez met in Turkey with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov. Two days earlier, Delcy had assured: “You’ll never see us on the side of war” and even called for peace between Ukraine and Russia, but she met with Putin’s minister at the same place where Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba couldn’t make progress in achieving a ceasefire agreement. 
• The White House reiterated that they don’t recognize Maduro, despite senior officials meeting with him. Press secretary Jen Psaki said that they met because their goal was to “bring American prisoners home.” Psaki assured that “the prisoners’ release wasn’t in exchange for sanctions relief or oil.” She highlighted that the country isn’t producing that much oil at the moment. The White House advisor for Latin America Juan González, who was in the delegation that traveled to Caracas, said that they keep recognizing Juan Guaidó as the caretaker president but that they’ll “talk to everyone to communicate our interests and work for democracy.” He added that the meeting sought to work for the reactivation of the negotiating process because “the future of Venezuela can only be determined by Venezuelans based on negotiations.” González confirmed that one of the topics was re-establishing direct flights between the U.S. and Venezuela but that their goal is to “restore democracy in the country.” 
• President Biden and President Ivan Duque met at the White House. Duque said that both countries know that the solution to the Venezuelan problem is restoring democracy. Duque said that Colombia’s position hasn’t changed and Biden told Duque about their intention to make Colombia a non-Nato ally. Duque offered Colombian oil to stabilize the prices. 

Delcy Rodríguez announced that the increase of the minimum wage will be effective on March 15th, but nothing has been published in the Official Gazette yet. Nicolás tied other promises to the possibility of extracting more minerals from the Mining Arc, in exchange for destroying the environment. 

• Zulia Governor Manuel Rosales supports going back to the negotiation in order to find solutions to the serious crisis. “Let’s not delay this any further, let’s set a date and return to the negotiation table. Let’s retake the humanitarian agenda with the urgency of the matter,” he said. 
• A group of lawyers went to the Supreme Tribunal of Justice to demand voiding the new TSJ law, approved in January by Maduro’s Assembly. They asked the TSJ justices to agree on a measure to suspend the law and its effects. 
• Aruba extended the prohibition on flights from Venezuela for three months. 
• After Ukraine warned that they lost all contact with Chernobyl after the power outage, Russia agreed to allow electric repairs in Chernobyl. IMF director Kristalina Georgieva said that the sanctions against Russia have caused an abrupt contraction of its economy. They’re facing a severe recession this year. She also said that this war has caused the contraction of global commerce and it’s made the prices of energy skyrocket. 
• Russian authorities contradicted each other all day, regarding the bombing of the maternity and children’s hospital in Mariupol: Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov assured that they’ll investigate the facts, the spokesperson of the Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova denied there was an attack and that it was “information terrorism” and the Defense Minister denied the bombing and accused Ukraine of organizing the incident. Lavrov defended the attack because the building had been taken over by Azov’s battalion and there were no patients or doctors there. Putin spoke on the phone with German chancellor Olaf Scholz and French president Emmanuel Macron. Macron said that he was “worried and pessimistic” because Putin’s position hasn’t changed. 
• Russia asked for a meeting of the UN Security Council to debate “military biological activities of the United States in Ukrainian territory.” 
• Interpol decided to strengthen control over the information Russia is sending out and vetoed their main office there. 
• Over 2.2 million people have left Ukraine and over 71 children have died since the invasion. Over 100 children have been injured. 
• The WHO said that there have been at least 18 attacks against medical personnel and facilities. 
• Kyiv still stands after 15 days.