Venezuela Has Given Up on Democracy

Venezuelan Update for Morons who Only Get Their Info from Partisan Comedians

Sanctions?

Venezuelan Desertions Up....

from Bloomberg

Military officers are joining the exodus of Venezuelans to Colombia and Brazil, fleeing barracks and forcing President Nicolas Maduro’s government to call upon retirees and militia to fill the void.

High desertion rates at bases in Caracas and the countryside are complicating security plans for the presidential election in 13 days, which by law require military custody of electoral materials and machinery at voting centers.

“The number is unknown because it used to be published in the Official Gazette. Now, it is not,” said Rocio San Miguel, director of Control Ciudadano, a military watchdog group in Caracas. She said soldiers are fleeing for the same reason citizens are: “Wages are low, the quality of food and clothing isn’t good.”

Last week, officers who rank as high as general were called in and quartered for several days at their units. Retired officials and militia members were also contacted by their superiors, according to one retired officer who asked not to be named for fear of angering the regime. Government officials are training these fill-in personnel for the election, said a second retired officer.

The shortage of troops comes as hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans flee a societal collapse, crowding cities and makeshift camps throughout the region in the largest mass emigration in modern Latin American history. Hyperinflation has made the currency virtually worthless, and malnutrition is endemic. Almost 2 million Venezuelans are living outside the country.

Amassing Power

As the once-prosperous nation fell apart, Maduro consolidated power by creating an all-powerful assembly to bypass the national legislature. The regime jailed and banned opponents and launched a wave of arrests before the May 20 vote. The U.S. and regional organizations have refused to recognize the balloting as legitimate, and the main opposition coalition has promised a boycott in the face of what it says will be a rigged contest.

Venezuelan elections are overseen by its military, the strongest force in the country and one increasingly intertwined with Maduro’s regime. The rush to fill out units is required by the so-called Plan Republica, the security deployment of the Defense Ministry that begins on the eve of election day and lasts until the day after. By law, the armed forces are guarantors of peace and security, guarding ballots and voting machines at all 14,000-odd voting sites. They transport these materials and machinery to each voting center, often a school, and guard it.

Silent Treatment

But the level of desertion from the Fuerza Armada Nacional Bolivariana has grown exponentially in the last year, especially among troops at lower ranks. At least 10,000 soldiers have asked to retire, Control Ciudadano’s San Miguel said in March.

“Since 2015 there has been an increase in military detainees accused of treason, desertion and other crimes,” she said. “Our estimate is that there are 300 people who are imprisoned, mostly troops. A few are senior officers, others are civilians linked to the military.”

A spokesman for the armed forces didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment on the desertions.

High-ranking members of the military are barred from much contact with the lower ranks . Lines of young military men asking for retirement are long, said the first retired officer. The officer tried to chat with one, but officers running the barracks forbade them from talking to each other. The retiree said top officers fear too much conversation will permit officers and enlisted solders to form alliances for a coup.

“Those who ask to retire are put into arrest for a week at the military counterintelligence headquarters,” said Gonzalo Himiob, director of Foro Penal, a human-rights group. “That’s how worried the government is.”

He said most leave the country after they are released. Himiob said that so many have tried to resign in recent days that the regime has no room to jail them, and many are allowed to quit.

Conoco Deals Knockout Blow to Venezuelan Economy

from Reuters

HOUSTON/CARACAS (Reuters) - U.S. oil firm ConocoPhillips has moved to take Caribbean assets of Venezuela’s state-run PDVSA to enforce a $2 billion arbitration award over a decade-oil nationalization of its projects in the South American country, according to three sources familiar with its actions.

The U.S. firm targeted facilities on the islands of Curacao, Bonaire and St. Eustatius that accounted for about a quarter of Venezuela’s oil exports last year. The three play key roles in processing, storing and blending PDVSA’s oil for export.

The company received court attachments freezing assets at least two of the facilities, and could move to sell them, one of the sources said.

Conoco’s legal maneuvers could further impair PDVSA’s declining oil revenue and the country’s convulsing economy. Venezuela is almost completely dependent on oil exports, which have fallen by a third since its peak and its refineries ran at just 31 percent of capacity in the first quarter.

The Latin American country is in the grip of a deep recession with severe shortages of medicine and food as well as a growing exodus of its people.

PDVSA and the Venezuelan foreign ministry did not respond on Sunday to requests for comment. Dutch authorities said they are assessing the situation on Bonaire.

Conoco’s claims against Venezuela and state-run PDVSA in international courts have totaled $33 billion, the largest by any company.

“Any potential impacts on communities are the result of PDVSA’s illegal expropriation of our assets and its decision to ignore the judgment of the ICC tribunal,” Conoco said in an email to Reuters.

The U.S firm added it will work with the community and local authorities to address issues that may arise as a result of enforcement actions.

PDVSA has significant assets in the Caribbean. On Bonaire, it owns the 10-million-barrel BOPEC terminal which handles logistics and fuel shipments to customers, particularly in Asia. In Aruba, PDVSA and its unit Citgo lease a refinery and a storage terminal.

On the island of St. Eustatius, it rents storage tanks at the Statia terminal, owned by U.S. NuStar Energy, where over 4 million barrels of Venezuelan crude were retained by court order, according to one of the sources.

NuStar is aware of the order and “assessing our legal and commercial options,” said spokesman Chris Cho. The company does not expect the matter to change its earnings outlook, he said.

Conoco also sought to attach PDVSA inventories on Curacao, home of the 335,000-barrel-per-day Isla refinery and Bullenbay oil terminal. But the order could not immediately be enforced, according to two of the sources.

Last year, PDVSA’s shipments from Bonaire and St Eustatius terminals accounted for about 10 percent of its total exports, according to internal figures from the state-run company. The exports were mostly crude and fuel oil for Asian customers including ChinaOil, China’s Zhenhua Oil and India’s Reliance Industries.

From its largest Caribbean operations in Curacao, PDVSA shipped 14 percent of its exports last year, including products exported by its Isla refinery to Caribbean islands and crude from its Bullenbay terminal to buyers of Venezuelan crude all over the world.

PDVSA on Friday ordered its oil tankers sailing across the Caribbean to return to Venezuelan waters and await further instructions, according to a document viewed by Reuters. In the last year, several cargoes of Venezuelan crude have been retained or seized in recent years over unpaid freight fees and related debts.

“This is terrible (for PDVSA),” said a source familiar with the court order of attachment. The state-run company “cannot comply with all the committed volume for exports” and the Conoco action imperils its ability to ship fuel oil to China or access inventories to be exported from Bonaire.

At the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), Conoco had sought up to $22 billion from PDVSA for broken contracts and loss of future profits from two oil producing joint ventures, which were nationalized in 2007 under late Venezuela President Hugo Chavez. The U.S. firm left the country after it could not reach a deal to convert its projects into joint ventures controlled by PDVSA.

A separate arbitration case involving the loss of its Venezuelan assets is before a World Bank tribunal, the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes.

Exxon Mobil Corp also has brought two separate arbitration claims over the 2007 nationalization of its projects in Venezuela.

What REALLY Happened in Nicaragua

from Reuters

MANAGUA (Reuters) - Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said on Sunday a planned overhaul of the welfare system that sparked days of deadly protests had been canceled, as he attempted to end the biggest crisis of his administration.

Ortega has been on the defensive since demonstrations began in much of the country on Wednesday against the plan to increase worker contributions to social security and to lower pensions.

Ensuing unrest killed at least eight people and sparked looting and panic buying, but protests in Managua died down considerably after Ortega’s announcement, according to Reuters witnesses. At least one protest march was planned for Monday.

The pope, the U.S. government and business leaders all urged Ortega to stop the violence before he appeared on television and said the measures approved last week would be withdrawn.

“The previous resolution of April 16, 2018, which was the resolution that kicked off this whole situation, is being revoked, canceled, put aside,” Ortega said.

The government argued welfare changes are needed to bolster Nicaragua’s finances, and Ortega said talks would be held to draft a new plan to strengthen the social security system.

But the government was stung by the protests, which one human rights group said had taken at least 25 lives. Stores in Managua were looted over the weekend, Reuters witnesses said.

Late on Saturday, local media said a reporter was shot and killed during a live broadcast from Bluefields, a town on the Caribbean coast hit by the unrest. Graphic footage of the incident soon spread onto local and social media.

The police crackdown on demonstrators and curbs on some media in the past few days have fueled broader criticism of Ortega, who has tightened his hold on the country’s institutions since he took office for a second time 11 years ago.

The U.S. State Department on Sunday called for “broad-based dialogue” to end the dispute and “restore respect” for human rights, urging the government to let the media operate freely.

“We condemn the violence and the excessive force used by police and others against civilians who are exercising their ... right to freedom of expression and assembly,” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in statement.

Lissett Guido, a Red Cross spokeswoman, said there were eight confirmed deaths and that the number could rise. The government had reported “almost 10” by late on Friday.

Marlin Sierra, director of human rights organization CENIDH, said it had logged 25 deaths, mostly caused by firearms and rubber bullets. That number could not be independently verified. Most of the dead were aged between 15 and 34, she said.

Pope Francis called on Sunday for an end to the violence and called for differences to be “resolved peacefully and with a sense of responsibility.”

Videos and photos posted on Nicaraguan media showed people standing ready to defend their stores, while others formed lines to stock up on gasoline and food in case of shortages.

Nicaragua has been one of the more stable countries in Central America, largely avoiding the turmoil caused by gang violence or political upheaval that has at times plagued Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala in recent years.

But top Nicaraguan business lobby COSEP has backed peaceful protests against the government, and said it would not enter talks with Ortega to review the social security plan until he had ended police repression and restored freedom of expression.

A former Marxist guerrilla and Cold War antagonist of the United States, Ortega has presided over a period of stable growth with a blend of socialist policies and capitalism.

But critics accuse Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, of trying to establish a family dictatorship. The country remains one of the poorest in the Americas.

Venezuela's Currency is in Freefall

from Bloomberg

Venezuela’s currency is worth even less than previously believed, with new trackers of the black-market rate showing deep discounts compared with the long-standing benchmark gauge.

Rates from the widely watched Dolartoday.com, known for arousing President Nicolas Maduro’s ire on state TV, have lagged behind other markers that show prices about 30 percent weaker. While the U.S.-based website posts a rate of 251,000 bolivars per dollar, DolarPro has it at 362,000 and e-wallet AirTM is selling dollars for 313,000 bolivars each.

“It’s about confidence, and Venezuelans feel that their dollars are worth more than DolarToday rates,” said Henkel Garcia, the director of the Caracas consultancy Econometrica. “In a market lacking information, new indicators will appear, and consumers will ultimately determine their sell price.”

With Venezuelans having limited access to official exchange markets, they’re reliant on websites that track the rate and small exchange platforms to get a sense of what their money is worth. As DolarToday falls out of favor, dollar auctions on Whatsapp groups, sites that host virtual wallets and cryptocurrency exchanges are seen as a better marker of true value. Amid skyrocketing inflation and a massive depreciation of the Venezuelan currency, even local businesses often demand foreign currency for nearly everything they offer.

Any way you count it, the bolivar is worth massively less than just five years ago. The current DolarToday rate has it down 99.99 percent in that time span. Meanwhile inflation in the country has been running at an annual rate of 6,147 percent.

Officials at DolarToday didn’t immediately respond to emails requesting information about how it calculates exchange rates and why it differs significantly from its competitors.

Maduro has long accused DolarToday of publishing artificially weak rates to stoke unrest and undermine his socialist administration. The Venezuelan government unsuccessfully sued the website in 2015 for falsifying exchange rates. More recently, Maduro announced the country’s Petro cryptocurrency would be sold through central bank foreign-currency auctions, to mark “the burial” of various black-market rate tracking platforms.

The same hyperinflation that led low-denomination bills to double as confetti at baseball games and crash deli scales pushed Venezuela to announce it would cut three zeroes off its currency starting June 4. The official rate is currently 49,478 bolivars per dollar.

“The proliferation of these sites will continue as long as the government doesn’t change its economic policy and make economic information more transparent,” said Juan Ignacio Guarino, president of Interbono exchange house, a Caracas-based brokerage.