Maduro calls Putin to express “strong support”

AFP– MOSCOW – Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro expressed his “strong support” for Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday during a phone call six days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin told reporters.

“Nicolás Maduro expressed his strong support for Russia’s key actions, condemning the destabilizing activity of the United States and NATO, and emphasizing the importance of combating the campaign of lies and disinformation launched by Western countries,” the dispatch statement said. Russian after the

Putin, meanwhile, “shared his vision of the situation regarding Ukraine, emphasizing that the objectives of the special military operation were to protect the civilian population of Donbass”, pro-Russian separatist territories in eastern Ukraine, as well as “as the sovereignty of  Crimea, the demilitarization and denazification of the Ukrainian state and the guarantee of its neutral and nonnuclear status”.

On the eve of the Russian military onslaught against Ukraine, Maduro expressed his support for the Russian government, a key ally of his administration torpedoed by US sanctions that seek to force him out of power, considering that his reelection in 2018 was “fraudulent”.

The Russian-Venezuelan relationship dates back to the time of the late President Hugo Chavez, who backed Russia during the blitzkrieg with Georgia in August 2008 for control of South Ossetia. After the conflict, Moscow recognized the independence of this province and that of Abkhazia, another pro-Russian separatist Georgian region.

Chávez (1999-2013) also bought Russian weapons and military equipment for hundreds of millions of dollars in the midst of an oil boom that ended in 2014.