Briefing

Colombia started TPS registration for Venezuelan migrants

The new National Electoral Council (CNE) authorities started working yesterday. Abraham Edgardo Ortega, former PDVSA executive director of financial planning was sentenced to two years and four months in prison, after admitting that he accepted over 12 million dollars in bribes

Naky Soto
  • The new National Electoral Council (CNE) authorities started working yesterday. Pedro Calzadilla, Maduro’s former minister, is presiding and former deputy Enrique Márquez is the vice president. Tania D’ Amelio will preside the electoral junta, where Roberto Picón and Carlos Quintero will also be working. 
  • With the excuse of relaunching the Chamba Juvenil mission, Maduro spoke about the agreement that managed to obtain for the CNE and bragged saying “Venezuela has an outstanding democratic life.” He said that chavismo called for national negotiation and that they sat with “all the oppositions, which is a historical agreement and a great step forward in democracy (…) It was a political agreement with all sectors of the opposition that has yielded a strong CNE in terms of institutionality,” he said. 
  • The U.S. released the patents of COVID-19 vaccines to increase production and to accelerate the fight against the pandemic. 
  • There were 5.7 million cases of COVID-19 this week, the highest since the pandemic started, 17 months ago. 
  • Ciro Ugarte, director of the PAHO Emergency Department, said that they’re still waiting for the confirmation of the second payment by Venezuela in order to have access to COVAX vaccines and said that “Venezuela is one of the countries with the least amount of vaccines per population”. 
  • “We’ve reached an important level of control on the second wave of the pandemic, we’ve increased the treatment (…) An important number of doses of the vaccine will arrive in May,” said Maduro last night. 
  • UNICEF announced the arrival of 50 freezers donated by the UK to Venezuela. UNICEF also obtained 50 extra freezers that haven’t arrived. Each freezer can store over 8,000 doses. 
  • Médicos Unidos de Venezuela reported 15 deaths in the healthcare sector between April 30th and May 4th, for a total of 537 deaths in the sector. 
  • The president of the Pensioners and Retired Workers Emilio Lozada said the recent wage increase is insufficient: “This increase wasn’t consulted with the sectors that represent most of the working class,” he said. 
    • Economist Asdrúbal Oliveros also considers this increase to be insufficient: “The road to rescuing wages implies several reforms and actions that are far from being done in Venezuela,” he said. He reiterated that, without deep reform, we’ll never save the value of salaries. 
  • Colombia started phase one of the TPS for Venezuelan migrants, which will benefit over 1,700,000 people. This phase can be done online and it’s free. Venezuelans have to register in the Sole Registry of Venezuelan Migrants and fill out a survey. 
  • FAES officers killed five alleged criminals in Petare, in an operation to find the murderers of officer Luis Zapata, who had been murdered this morning in El Carpintero slum, according to journalist Román Camacho.
  • Abraham Edgardo Ortega, former PDVSA executive director of financial planning was sentenced to two years and four months in prison, after admitting that he accepted over 12 million dollars in bribes, which were transferred to accounts abroad. He’s the first Venezuelan executive to cooperate with federal authorities in a case of embezzlement and money laundering. 
  • The Spanish Foreign Minister issued a communique where they called the appointment of the new CNE board of authorities as a “first step” but highlighted that there are still measures to be taken in order to achieve “fair, credible and transparent elections.” 
  • OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro exhorted Nayib Bukele, president of El Salvador, to respect power independence and abandon the road that has been already traveled by Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Bolivia. 
  • The political parties that make up the Unitary Platform asked the international community to focus its efforts on achieving an agreement between the actors who could guarantee a solution to the conflict. They said they’re willing to undergo a process of serious agreements that would provide a real political solution and truly free elections.

Naky Soto

Naky gets called Naibet at home and at the bank. She coordinates training programs for an NGO. She collects moments and turns them into words. She has more stories than freckles.

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