For our 20-year anniversary as an anti-imperialist outlet working on the ground from Venezuela, we've decided to celebrate with a colorful, revolutionary brand new look!

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High up in Venezuela’s Andes, the township of Mucuchies is home to a campesino-led initiative striving for sustainable agricultural production. Integral Producers of the Highlands [PROINPA, for the organization’s Spanish-language name] is widely recognized not only for its top-notch seed potatoes but also for its scientific initiatives such as a state-of-the-art seed lab, a germplasm bank, and, most recently, an aeroponic seed production facility.

One of the secrets to PROINPA’s success is its democratic organization and emphasis on education. Founded 24 years ago, the organization’s structure has an assembly of associated producers as its topmost level of decision-making. That is, at PROINPA, it is the producers themselves who are in charge. These associates are all hard-working campesinos but have also achieved high levels of formal education. Many have doctorates or masters, and all have gone through educational processes centered on the science and sustainability of food production.

PROINPA’s core mission of food sovereignty is of strategic importance to a country under siege. The organization pursues this goal by promoting agroecology, crop diversification, endogenous scientific development, and a new social organization of production.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/campesinos-as-scientists-proinpa-combats-seed-dependency-part-i/

Venezuela launched Thursday a digital tool dubbed the “Geopolitical Map of Sanctions” at the United Nations (UN) in New York as part of an effort to document and denounce the use of unilateral coercive measures.

Considered a “High-Level Side Event” during the UN General Assembly (UNGA), the debut of the “Geopolitical Map of Sanctions” counted on the attendance and interventions of representatives of various countries targeted by unilateral coercive measures, including Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran and Russia.

The launch of the anti-sanctions instrument comes after President Nicolás Maduro called on the Group of 77 plus China at a recent summit to lead a campaign at the UN to end sanctions.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-debuts-geopolitical-map-of-sanctions-at-united-nations-in-new-york/

The governments of Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago struck an agreement to advance a joint energy project.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro hosted Trinidadian Energy Minister Stuart Richard Young on Wednesday at Miraflores Palace. Young co-signed the deal with Venezuelan Oil Minister Pedro Tellechea in a televised press conference.

The two nations, through their respective state-owned companies Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) and National Gas Company (NGC), will explore offshore natural gas at the Dragon field, located in Venezuelan waters.

“Today’s deal and the project to jointly produce and sell gas is a message of cooperation, solidarity and shared sovereignty,” Maduro said. “It is a message of peace for the whole Caribbean.”

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-strikes-trinidad-natural-gas-deal-raises-essequibo-claim-against-guyana/

A large-scale military-police procedure took control of one of Venezuela’s most dangerous prisons, which allegedly served as the base of the transnational criminal organization “Tren de Aragua” (Aragua Train).

On September 20, around 11,000 officers from the Venezuelan Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB) alongside the national police launched the “Cacique Guaicaipuro Liberation Operation” in the Aragua Penitentiary Center, known as the Tocorón prison, located in the northern Aragua state.

In a televised address following the operation, Interior Minister Remigio Ceballos informed that some 1,600 prisoners were in custody and would be transferred to 85 other detention centers across the country.

The Venezuelan minister stressed that “human rights were guaranteed” during the procedure while family members of the detainees, including women and children who reportedly lived inside the facilities, had been evacuated from the place and put into safety. According to reports, one army officer died during the operation in accidental circumstances.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuelan-army-takes-down-transnational-crime-organization-in-tocoron-prison/

Venezuelan human rights advocacy group SURES questioned the repeated renewal of the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council’s Independent International Fact-finding Mission on Venezuela.

“We view with concern the continuous renewal of the mandate of this mission since 2019, which establishes additional procedures beyond those responsible for monitoring the implementation of international treaties signed by Venezuela,” SURES Director María Lucrecia Hernández told the Human Rights Council in Geneva during its 54th session on Monday.

Since its inception in 2019, the Independent International Fact-finding Mission has been repeatedly criticized by the Venezuelan government and human rights advocates working inside the country as having a politically driven mandate and flawed methodology.

The Venezuelan government maintains that the initiative forms part of a broader effort by the United States and its allies to promote regime change in Venezuela.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuelan-human-rights-group-casts-doubt-on-un-international-fact-finding-mission-and-methodology/

A couple of weeks ago, the water pipe that supplies my building, the school next door and a number of small businesses, burst.

A local handyman examined the problem and did all he could. But on this occasion his solution was very “artisanal”. He lifted the drain and tied up a shitload of old shirts in the spot where the water was leaking.

Let’s say the leak became less obvious but still very much unsolved. It reminded me of one time when a pipe burst in my house and I temporarily fixed it with cork from a bottle cap. Only in this case there were hundreds of people affected.

It was obvious that a proper solution needed, as a minimum, to break the pavement and replace the pipe altogether. In other words, something to be done by the proper authorities.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/columns/tales-of-resistance-public-services-and-market-logic/

Dozens of feminist organizations staged a rally to demand free, legal and safe abortion and to denounce the influence of religious anti-rights groups inside the government.

Despite the heavy rain, feminist activists and allied LGBTQI+ groups gathered on Thursday outside the National Assembly (AN) in Caracas to bring attention to the lack of legislation regarding sexual and reproductive rights while abortion continues to be criminalized in the country’s penal code.

The activity was called “Green Gathering” and it was held to commemorate International Safe Abortion Day. The event was organized by the “Ruta Verde” [Green Route] platform, which brings together feminist collectives from across Venezuela in the struggle for women’s rights, especially abortion.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/multimedia/venezuela-feminist-collectives-demand-abortion-rights-state-church-separation/

Multinational corporation ConocoPhillips is seeking to join a court-mandated sale of CITGO shares to collect on a US $8.5 billion international arbitration award.

The company seeks to have a writ of attachment approved by a Delaware District Court so that the upcoming auction process can fulfill the compensation granted by the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in 2019 for the nationalization of oil assets by the former Hugo Chávez government in Venezuela.

Though its award is still undergoing an appeal at the ICSID, ConocoPhillips secured a default ruling to enforce the award from a Washington, D.C. court in late 2021. The decision followed a repeated failure by lawyers representing the US-backed “interim government” to show up in court.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-conocophillips-targets-citgo-as-opposition-authorities-try-to-stall-auction/

Hugo Chávez talked a great deal about seeds, both figuratively and literally. For him, the commune was a seed of socialism. More literally, however, socialism implied sovereignty with regard to both seeds and food production. In this section, PROINPA associates explain their efforts to produce seeds and thereby contribute to food sovereignty in Venezuela.

"Potatoes, along with rice, sugar, meat, and dairy products, are among the main foodstuffs in the world. In Venezuela, we have sovereignty in the potato production sector, though not in seed production. Although PROINPA has significantly contributed to Venezuela’s potato sovereignty, there’s still a lot of work to be done.

As [20th-century intellectual] Uslar Pietri wisely pointed out, “We need to sow petroleum.” More investment is essential to fully consolidate our sovereignty in terms of seed potato production," explains potato producer Gerardo (Lalo) Rivas Gil.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/open-science-proinpa-breaks-with-seed-dependency-part-ii/

Venezuelan Vice-President Delcy Rodríguez commended the “bravery” of the Puebla Group for its efforts to confront aggressions and unilateral sanctions against her country by the US and allied right-wing governments in the region.

The Puebla Group, founded in 2019 as a space to unite progressive parties and leaders from Latin America and the Caribbean, held its 9th Gathering in its namesake city in Mexico on Saturday and Sunday. The official slogan was “Moving forward in unity.”

More than 200 representatives from 18 countries, including numerous former presidents such as Ecuador’s Rafael Correa and Bolivia’s Evo Morales, discussed multilateralism, the climate change crisis, and regional unity in the face of an emerging multipolar global order.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuelan-vp-celebrates-puebla-group-bravery-at-progressive-blocs-9th-gathering-in-mexico/

The Venezuelan opposition has confirmed the use of manual voting for the primary election scheduled for October 22, rejecting the automated process offered by the National Electoral Council (CNE).

In a communique released on Monday, the opposition’s National Primary Commission (CNP) argued that on June 5 they requested a meeting with the country’s electoral authorities to define the technical assistance for the primary race but ten days later several CNE board members resigned their posts and the talks never continued. As a result, the commission carried on with self-organizing the vote.

Following the resignation of the electoral authorities on June 15, Venezuela’s National Assembly (AN) began the long process of drawing selections from a list of 104 candidates. The new CNE board was finally announced on August 24 charged with the task to oversee the 2024 presidential election.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuelan-opposition-insists-on-manual-voting-for-primary-election/

In Part III of our "Campesino Resistance" series, we delve into PROINPA’s educational initiatives and the impact of US sanctions on production and life.

"Sovereignty is about a country being able to determine its future without foreign intervention. US Imperialism is determined to destroy our revolution because Chávez tried to make Venezuela both independent and socialist.

In this beautiful highland, we are determined to make sure that Chávez’s dream doesn’t disappear. Our contribution here is working hard so that we are sovereign in terms of seeds. In doing so, we are also showing that sovereignty is not a chimera: sovereignty is what we are building now at PROINPA!"

https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/education-science-and-sovereignty-proinpa-vs-the-us-blockade-part-iii/

Venezuelan social movements organized under the banner of the Palestine Solidarity Platform defended the Palestinian people’s right to resist colonialism and occupation following an offensive action Saturday carried out against Israel by Hamas and other armed elements of the Palestinian resistance movement.

“From the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, the members of different social organizations, that are joined together in the Palestine Solidarity Platform, raise our voice in support of the resistance of its brave, noble, and native people who today, as always, fight for their liberation,” read a statement by the umbrella organization.

Naming Israel an “Apartheid regime which subjugates the Palestinian people in a much more cruel way than what was experienced in South Africa,” the communique pinned the blame for the outbreak of further violence on Israel’s flaunting of international law and the political, legal, and economic support of the United States toward Tel Aviv.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuelan-social-movements-back-palestinians-right-to-resist/

In his weekly TV program, President Nicolás Maduro condemned the genocide committed by Israel against Palestine, especially the bombing and blockade of the Gaza Strip. He called for peace and pledged to send humanitarian help to the Palestinian people.