The foreign minister of the tiny South American nation of Guyana has said that neighbouring Venezuela is “on the wrong side of history” as it risks sparking conflict over an oil-rich and long-contested swath of rainforest.
Tensions between the two countries have reached unprecedented heights ahead of a referendum on Sunday intended to rubber-stamp Venezuela’s claim on the region of Essequibo.
Among the five questions President Nicolás Maduro is asking his citizens is whether they should convert the 160,000 sq km area into a new Venezuelan state.
It remains unclear what the legal or practical implications of a yes vote would be, and the referendum is widely seen as a way for the deeply unpopular dictator to drum up public support ahead of presidential elections next year. But there are growing concerns that Maduro could push the country into war as he uses the century-old dispute to whip up patriotic fervour.
“People in the border region are very concerned,” Guyana’s foreign minister, Hugh Todd, told the Guardian. “Maduro is a despotic leader, and despotic leaders are very hard to predict.”
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The foreign minister of the tiny South American nation of Guyana has said that neighbouring Venezuela is “on the wrong side of history” as it risks sparking conflict over an oil-rich and long-contested swath of rainforest.
It remains unclear what the legal or practical implications of a yes vote would be, and the referendum is widely seen as a way for the deeply unpopular dictator to drum up public support ahead of presidential elections next year.
Maduro has presented history lessons on state television, interrupted school classes to get young children to cheer on the country’s territorial claim and handed out revised maps depicting an engorged Venezuela straddling a Guyana a fraction of its internationally recognised size.
The socialist government has also released a series of highly polished campaign videos of Venezuelan children playing in the lush forests and cascading waterfalls and an official song, The Essequibo is Ours.
Venezuela’s interior minister, Vladimir Padrino López, has shown no interest in calming the rising tensions, telling his troops earlier this month: “We are ready to defend [Essequibo] to the last drop of blood and sweat.”
Though Todd says Caracas’s ambassador to Georgetown has told the country’s leadership that Venezuela has no intention of invading, Guyana remains on high alert owing to Maduro’s unpredictability.
The original article contains 1,408 words, the summary contains 212 words. Saved 85%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!