Maduro apologizes for blocking entry of former representatives who will monitor elections | World

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro apologized on Saturday (27) for using his veto power against a group of former presidents, members of Congress and former parliamentarians. They were banned from entering the country to monitor the presidential elections. On Sunday, after an invitation from the opposition.

“I apologize because in Spain, Mexico and Panama they were angry with Venezuela because we sent these people back. I apologize for sending them back,” he added. [Vicente] “Fox for Mexico, Mireya Moscoso for Panama, people were very angry in Panama and Spain,” Maduro said in a meeting with international observers invited by the National Electoral Council.

Venezuelan authorities on Friday blocked the entry of several former governors, deputies and parliamentarians who planned to monitor the elections in which Maduro's main rival, diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia, 74, who represented leader Maria in the electoral ballot, was disqualified.

Panama's President, José Raúl Molino, has denounced Venezuela for blocking a Cubana flight that would have transported several former rulers from Panama to Venezuela.

On board were former presidents Moscoso, Fox, Miguel Angel Rodriguez (Costa Rica) and Jorge Quiroga (Bolivia), members of the right-wing Democratic Initiative for Spain and the Americas (IDEA Group) and strong critics of Maduro.

About ten members of Congress and MEPs from the Spanish Popular Party reported being deported. The same happened to a parliamentarian from Colombia and another from Ecuador.

Chavista strongman Diosdado Cabello warned on Wednesday that those observers would be denied entry because they were not invited by the electoral authority.

According to Maduro, the National Electoral Congress has invited 910 observers from 100 countries.

“Here there is a law and the law is respected,” the president said, stressing that the results “will be recognized and respected throughout the republic.”

The National Electoral Commission had received an invitation from former Argentine President Alberto Fernández, but the organization asked him this week not to travel to Venezuela because it considered him to be non-neutral, after he said that if Maduro were defeated in the elections, “what would he do? To do? To do is to accept.”

The National Election Commission also cancelled an invitation to send a European Union observation mission.