Venezuela is still wearing the face of an old dictatorship

Seven months have passed since the historic arrest and removal from power of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro. The tyranny appears to be down, but not done.

The highly enriched uranium was removed, a Hezbollah terrorist was captured, the leader of the Tren de Aragua gang was eliminated and the oil industry is slowly recovering.

Despite this, 379 political prisoners have still not been released. There is still no electoral calendar, and María Corina Machado, the leading opposition figure, remains in exile.

Against this backdrop, a new dialogue began between the interim government and representatives of the opposition National Assembly elected in 2015. The talks — which did not include Machado — addressed issues such as the response to the June 24 earthquake and the strengthening of democracy and political rights and guarantees. The release of political prisoners was not explicitly mentioned.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio acknowledged the challenging task ahead.

“You are dealing with a system that’s been in place for over a quarter-century, so those are deep roots that you have to deal with. It’s also a country that faces a lot of problems, I mean a lot of economic problems, not to mention now they’ve had an earthquake.”

He said stabilization is key to avoiding civil war, mass migration or civil unrest, and the nation........

© The Hill