Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro celebrates after partial results were announced by the electoral council in Caracas, Venezuela, on July 29. One month after the election, the United States again called on him to provide evidence of his widely disputed victory. File Photo by Ronald Pena/EPA-EFE
Aug. 29 (UPI) — The United States on Thursday again called on Venezuelan authorities to produce evidence proving that President Nicolas Maduro indeed was the winner of the presidential election held one month ago.
Maduro and the country’s National Electoral Council claimed the strongman ruler beat democratic opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez in the July 28 poll despite what Washington calls “overwhelming evidence” that Gonzalez easily received the most votes.
Domestic and international critics have called on the council to release original tally sheets from the election, but the body has so far refused to do so, sparking widespread unrest across the country in which 23 people were killed by state forces between July 28 and Aug. 8, according to the United Nations.
Venezuela’s high court, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice, certified the agency’s decision naming Maduro the winner last week.
The U.S. State Department marked the one-month anniversary of the election by again demanding transparency from the Maduro government.
“In spite of repeated calls from Venezuelans and the international community, the Maduro-controlled National Electoral Council (CNE) has failed to substantiate its announced results by producing original tally sheets, as it did following the 2013 and 2018 elections,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement.
“The CNE’s ongoing refusal to uphold international and Venezuelan standards of transparency or to respect the will of the Venezuelan people as expressed at the polls is an unacceptable violation of Venezuela’s laws, as is the attempt by the Maduro-controlled Supreme Tribunal of Justice to silence the voices of the Venezuelan voters by ratifying the CNE’s unsubstantiated announcement of a Maduro victory,” he said.
The one-month anniversary also brought protesters back out onto the streets of Caracas.
Hundreds of demonstrators answered the call of the opposition Democratic Unitary Platform by calling for a “peaceful transition” and demanding the electoral council release the original tally sheets.
Meanwhile, Maduro denounced the protests and reiterated his claims of victory, warning the international community, “Do not stick your nose into Venezuela’s internal affairs,” and accusing his opponents of being in a “satanic pact” with X owner Elon Musk.
