MEPs decided in Strasbourg on Thursday to recognise opposition leader Edmundo González Urrutia as “the legitimate, democratically elected president of Venezuela”, in a text denounced by the left and the centre as collusion between the right and the far right.
The resolution, which is not binding, was adopted by a majority of 309 votes to 201, with 12 abstentions.
In this text, the MEPs condemn “the electoral fraud orchestrated by the National Electoral Council controlled by the regime” of Nicolás Maduro, and recall that the presidential election of July did not “respect international standards in terms of electoral integrity”.
They call on the European Union and the Member States to recognise Edmundo González Urrutia as the legitimate president of Venezuela, and to do “everything possible” so that he can “take office on 10 January 2025”.
“We Venezuelans want the same thing as Europeans: to live in freedom and democracy,” Edmundo González Urrutia said on X, thanking the European Parliament for this vote.
The Venezuelan National Assembly, where Nicolás Maduro’s government has an absolute majority – the opposition having boycotted the 2020 legislative elections – has “categorically repudiated the harmful aggression promoted by the fascist right of the European Parliament.”
Referring to the European Parliament’s support in 2019 for opposition figure Juan Guaido, who had declared himself president, the Venezuelan assembly condemned “the illegal and illegitimate practice of the European Parliament of recognizing fictitious governments.” The opposition had put an end to the Guaido experiment in 2023.
While denouncing “the autocracy of the Maduro regime”, Raphaël Glucksmann, the leader of the French delegation of social democrats in the European Parliament, deplored that this resolution had been drafted and supported by the right-wing group of the European People’s Party (EPP), and the two far-right groups of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), of which Marion Maréchal is a member, who supported the text, and Patriots for Europe (PfE), to which the president of the National Rally Jordan Bardella belongs.
The latter did not take part in the vote, but the PfE supported the text.
“This deeply worrying act shows the total lack of scruples or reluctance of conservatives to ally themselves with political forces contrary to the fundamental values of democratic Europe,” said Raphaël Glucksmann, who supported several amendments but did not take part in the vote on the resolution as a whole, in a statement.
The centrist group Renew also indicated in a press release that it had not participated in the vote on this resolution, denouncing the participation of Patriots for Europe in its drafting, and refusing the “normalization” of the extreme right.
After Venezuela’s July presidential elections, Nicolás Maduro was declared the winner by the National Electoral Council, and his victory was later validated by the Supreme Court. Both institutions are accused of being subservient to the government.
The opposition claims that Gonzalez Urrutia won the election with more than 60% of the vote, based on the voting records provided by its poll workers. It is calling for another demonstration on September 28.
Mr González Urrutia, threatened with imprisonment in his country, has been in exile for ten days in Spain, which has granted him asylum.