Caracas Chronicles

Spanish and Colombian media outlets reported that President Gustavo Petro will ask Nicolás to be a guarantor in the peace process that Colombia will start with the ELN. Petro and Nicolás have allegedly talked about this issue and will set a date to discuss it. Venezuelan NGOs have denounced the presence of the ELN in Venezuela, protected by the regime and chavismo hasn’t done anything about the ELN’s behavior. If Petro is asking for this, it probably means chavismo and ELN would get along. Las Américas newspaper reported that two ELN commanders in Cuba will travel to Caracas to meet with some guerrilla leaders and set their conditions to start a peace process. Maduro said he would play the role of “guarantor” of this peace process. 

Venezuelan oil production increased by 94,000 bpd in August compared to July, a 14% increase, according to the September OPEC report, which in turn holds the figures reported by each country. Venezuela produced an average of 723,000 bpd, which keeps PDVSA far from the goal set by Nicolás, who said they’d be producing 2 million bpd by the end of 2022. However, secondary sources say that Venezuela produced 678,000 bpd in August. 

Carabobo governor Rafael Lacava said that he won’t be a candidate in the 2024 election because of his close relationship with Nicolás Maduro. 

Professor Francisco Monaldi explained that the sanctions didn’t cause this mediocre figure but that Venezuela’s true limitations have been “institutional and political.” 

Colombia installed the Inter-Institutional Unit for Reactivating Relations with Venezuela. 

Transportation ministers and other aeronautical authorities had a meeting to speed up processes and restart flights. 

Colombian authorities captured ten members of a Venezuelan criminal gang. The mayor of Bogota said this band fights the Tren de Aragua for control of the small-scale drug trafficking in Bogota and reiterated her request to Foreign Minister Alvaro Leyva to negotiate measures against leaders of the Tren de Aragua, who keep committing crimes from prison in Venezuela. 

The Venezuelan Central Bank published figures for August: 8.2% inflation, less than half the estimates by the Venezuelan Observatory of Finance. The dollar hit a new record yesterday: 8.004 bolivars per dollar. It has increased 1.37% in September. 

Delcy Rodríguez said that Venezuela is willing to negotiate re-entering the Comunidad Andina de Naciones (CAN). She said that restarting binational relations with Colombia is an opportunity to restart this integration mechanism. 

Franks Cabaña has been in prison for five years, a victim of a process without evidence. He was accused of terrorism because he made a phone call to his friend Óscar Pérez, a cop who was brutally executed by the State in 2018. 

Lupa por la Vida registered 67 extrajudicial executions in Miranda and the Capital District during the first half of 2022. February was the most lethal month, with 20 cases. 

Prepara Familia reported the death of seven-year-old Stephany Muñoz, a patient at the J.M. de los Ríos Hospital. Since 2017, 72 Venezuelan children have died waiting for transplants. 

The Panamanian Border Service ruled out they found a common grave with 18 bodies of migrants. They said they are sorry to see people taking information about the flow of migrants in the Darien Gap out of context. 

Venezuela offered at least 5 million hectares of land in agreements for agricultural investment with producers from Iran and other countries, reported Agriculture Minister Wilmar Castro Soteldo.

Argentinian authorities authorized 12 out of 19 crewmembers of the Iranian-Venezuelan Emtrasur plane, after three months. The ruling orders to settle the other seven crewmembers’ situation as soon as possible. 

During the first UN Human Rights Council session, Nicolás’s representative ruled out an investigation mechanism for Myanmar with a lie: he said that it was imposed and politically motivated, therefore showcasing its alliance with another regime responsible for serious human rights violations. 

Canada reported that alongside 17 countries and the EU, they met to “reiterate their commitment to a peaceful and negotiated solution for Venezuela, to restore democracy” and they exhorted “all parts involved to return to the negotiation in Mexico and support the agreements.” Colombia, Costa Rica, and Panama didn’t participate.