“We clearly stated that we were going or wanted to go to Venezuela because Guests of Edmundo (Gonzalez Urrutia) and Maria Corina“It was an accompaniment, (…) not as witnesses, because obviously we did not have the opportunity to register with the National Electoral Council (of Venezuela),” said former Colombian Vice President Marta Lucía Ramírez in the Panamanian capital.

The former vice president of Colombia made her statement at a press conference at the presidential palace with L.Former Presidents Mireya Moscoso of Panama, Miguel Angel Rodriguez of Costa Rica, Jorge Quiroga of Bolivia and Vicente Fox of Mexicoa few hours after getting off the Copa Airlines plane.

According to the Panamanian government, the obstruction to the flight was caused by Venezuelan government ‘blocks airspace’ countries and “delayed planes” of Copa airlines, including those on which these former presidents were traveling, “for several hours” due to “unrelated political issues” and following a “unanimous” decision by the Venezuelan executive branch.

These leaders They are part of the Democratic Initiative of Spain and America (IDEA) group. and they were going to the polls this Sunday in support of the candidacy of Edmundo González Urrutia, standard-bearer of the opposition coalition Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD).

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox said he was sad about the barriers to entry into Venezuela and described current Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who is seeking re-election after 11 years in power, as a “little dictator with seven soles.”

From Caracas, the main opposition coalition in Venezuela, The Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD) condemned the fact that the group was not allowed to travel.

“We strongly condemn this fact because, we repeat, if there is one thing that we, Democrats, want in our country, it is for there to be clean voting processor intact, transparent, of which we can all be proud,” opposition member Delsa Solorzano said at a press conference.

Venezuela also prevented entry Delegation of parliamentarians from the Spanish People’s Party (PP) who was also invited by the opposition to attend Sunday’s elections.

The MPs, MEPs and Senators from the PP, led by Member of the European Parliament Esteban Gonzalez Pons and the PP’s representative in Congress, Miguel Tellado, has traveled to Venezuela to witness the presidential elections this Sunday.

According to PP sources, local authorities reported that they were banned from entering the country and deported, so they had to return to Spain.

Deputy spokeswoman for Spain’s Popular Party, Cayetana Alvarez, said the blockade of the Venezuelan opposition’s guests was an act of “a crazy dictatorship that does not want to see witnesses to its defeat,” warning of an attempt at “massive fraud” by the government of ruling Nicolas Maduro.

Colombian politicians deported

Colombian Senator Angelica Lozano and former Bogota Mayor Claudia Lopez said Friday they were deported from Venezuela, the country they had traveled to meet with opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, and that their passports were taken away from them for an hour and a half “without arguments or information.”

“They are taking us away for no reason (…) in solidarity with this suffering country,” Lozano said in a video recorded while being escorted to Maiquetia International Airport in Caracas.

The Chilean government sent a letter to the Venezuelan government note of protest for obstructing the entry of senators into the country Felipe Kast (centre-right) and José Manuel Rojo Edwards (far right), invited by the Venezuelan opposition.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the Venezuelan ambassador to Chile, Arevalo Mendez, to deliver a note of protest over the fact that migrants were not allowed to enter that country. Senators Jose Manuel Rojo Edwards and Felipe Cast“, – the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a short statement.

Kast, from the Evopoli party, said on his social media that they were going to be deported because they did not meet the “profile or conditions for entry into the country.”

The Presidium of the Chilean Senate assured that the events are “undemocratic” and “mean the greatest seriousness”, since “Chilean senators have all the conditions that are usually required by the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela to enter its territory”.

(According to EFE)