FRENCH President Emmanuel Macron yesterday met Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, who is leading an international charm offensive aimed at building support for his bid to oust his country’s leader.

Guaido is recognised as Venezuela’s interim president by the US and 50 other countries, but has so far failed to shift Nicolas Maduro from power despite months of struggle and an ongoing economic crisis.

“France supports the rapid organisation of a free and transparent presidential election” in Venezuela, Macron said on Twitter after the meeting at the Elysee Palace.

But Maduro’s foreign minister, Jorge Arreaza, responded by telling the French leader to concentrate on tackling the recent protests in his own nation.

“A deaf and arrogant government… cannot give lessons in democracy to anyone, and certainly not to Venezuela,” he tweeted in French.

Guaido defied a travel ban to meet officials in London and Brussels before heading to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this week.

Despite giving him a warm welcome, European Union officials have not announced concrete measures to help foster a political solution to Venezuela’s deepening political and economic crisis.

“We are facing an international criminal conglomerate, and we need your help,” Guaido told Davos participants.

“Alone, we are not going to get there.”

It was in Davos last year that several heads of state recognised Guaido as Venezuela’s interim president.

Despite presiding over the economic collapse of his oil-rich nation, Maduro is still in charge, defying a growing list of US and EU sanctions. – AFP, January 25, 2020.