APPG on Venezuela

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Subject: Venezuela - Financial Times

OpEd Luis Almagro

Venezuela
The world has a responsibility to protect the people of Venezuela

Probing the Maduro government for crime against humanity is just a first step
LUIS ALMAGRO

As an international community, we have failed to live up to our responsibilities in Venezuela. Former US president Bill Clinton once told the people of Rwanda: “It may seem strange to you here, especially the many of you who lost members of your family, but all over the world there were people like me sitting in offices, day after day after day, who did not fully appreciate the depth and speed with which you were being engulfed by this unimaginable terror.” His quote could easily be applied to the Venezuelan humanitarian crisis taking place today. The cases are different, as are the crimes committed, but the world is showing the same inaction in the face of suffering, gross violations of human rights, and crimes against humanity. There has been discussion in recent weeks of military intervention and what must be done. Let me be clear, I will unequivocally condemn any illegitimate armed attack, invasion or aggression. We must act in accordance with public international law — including the UN’s 2005 “responsibility to protect” commitment to prevent genocide, and international criminal law — and the international norms that protect democracy and our rights and freedoms. But we can no longer allow ourselves to be accomplices to the crimes of Nicolás Maduro’s regime. The entire premise of ideas such as the responsibility to protect is that we must act before we are counting the dead. When we do not act soon enough, we are forced to confront a state-run killing machine. The commitment to prevent genocide is the one last hope for victims who have been forgotten. It is not about the protection of governments, nor is it a question of ideology. Our responsibility is to the people that make up our societies — it is to humanity. Nearly three years ago, I first publicly raised my concerns about Mr Maduro’s slide into dictatorship. The Organization of American States tracked and documented the regime’s assault on its country as it dismantled, co-opted and corrupted its institutions. Its rampant corruption and incompetence has created the most devastating humanitarian crisis our hemisphere has experienced. Back then there was no political will to act. The international community shirked its responsibility, hiding behind a misinterpretation of the notion of non-intervention to maintain the status quo. While the world waited, the Maduro regime tightened its grasp on power and the suffering of the Venezuelan people worsened. More than 12,000 Venezuelans have been arbitrarily detained, more than 1,300 political prisoners incarcerated, more than 131 protesters killed by state security forces or government-aligned paramilitaries, and more than 8,000 murdered extrajudicially. Detainees are tortured and abused, in some cases r***d or subjected to other forms of sexual violence. And this is just what we can already prove. The regime has used the country’s humanitarian crisis as a weapon, depriving civilians of food and essential medicines. We cannot begin to measure the lives lost due to a lack of medicine, or to a failure to receive life-saving care, or simply from complications because even basic sanitary conditions cannot easily be met in the country’s hospitals. This crisis has created a lost generation. More than 2.3m people — more than 7 per cent of the Venezuelan population — have fled the country in the past three years, according to UN estimates in July, and hundreds more do so every day. If current trends continue, a further 1.5m will leave in the next year, forced out of their homes. They are flooding into neighbouring countries in search of food, shelter, healthcare, and employment. This is larger than the recent migrant crisis that shook the establishment in Europe, and it is now threatening the stability and security of the region. The greatest tragedies of our lifetime are a result of the failure to act. In Rwanda, should we have intervened after 100, 1,000, or 10,000 deaths? The international community has allowed this to happen too many times. Our inaction and indecision has allowed too many crises to escalate until they reach a scale that is an affront to all of humanity. The responsibility to protect commitment requires leaving all options on the table. This is not a message of violence; it is the opposite. We must do everything within our power to end the violence, to stop the repression, and bring an end to the suffering of the Venezuelan people. This is why one year ago I initiated a process at the OAS to consider whether crimes against humanity have been perpetrated by the regime in Venezuela. In May 2018, I personally submitted the case to the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court. On Wednesday, six countries took the historic step of asking the ICC to investigate. This is a first and vital step in addressing the crisis. We must do more. We must consider every tool and measure available to us. We must address the corruption that is starving an entire country’s population, and provide humanitarian assistance to those who are desperately in need. We must act — it is already too late.

The writer is the secretary-general of the Organisation of American States

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