Venezuela claims at the UN that Maduro is facing an attempted coup

The Venezuelan Foreign Minister claimed on Wednesday, whilst visiting the United Nations in New York, that the Government of Nicolas Maduro is facing an attempted coup backed by the United States.

“We have told the Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, that an attempted coup in Venezuela is underway again,” the Venezuelan foreign minister, Jorge Arreaza, said at a press conference during which he did not accept any questions.

Arreaza, who then also avoided journalists in the corridors of the UN building, accused Washington for trying to use Venezuela’s Constitution to “organize a coup” in the country.

Arreaza, who met Guterres in New York, said this after the US Vice President, Mike Pence, on Tuesday promised to support the president of the National Assembly of Venezuela, opposition leader Juan Guaido, and also asked him to “build unity among the political groups” to achieve the “restoration of democracy” in the Caribbean country.

The Venezuelan foreign minister also attacked his US counterpart, Mike Pompeo, who on Wednesday praised the National Assembly for formally declaring Maduro’s “usurpation of the Presidency” and for temporarily transferring the Executive’s powers to the Legislative.

Arreaza criticized that Pompeo cited articles of the Constitution of Venezuela for trying to organize a coup and made it clear that the country will resist any attempts to provoke a “regime change by force.”

In his twenty-minute speech to journalists, the minister protested the permanent interference, intrusion, interference of the United States, its government, its dominant elite and the satellite governments of the United States in Venezuela.

He also denounced the “economic blockade” imposed by Washington and said that it is complicated for his country to make some essential products or otherwise has to pay high prices for them.