More than 450 delegates were present in El Maizal Commune, Lara State, for the founding congress of the Communard Union. The collective aims to build a network of social organizations throughout the country.

“Popular power is the guarantee for a transition towards socialism in Venezuela. We need its voice to be listened to and taken into account,” said the newly appointed Commune Minister Jorge Arreaza.

Former President Hugo Chávez proposed communes as the “unit cells” for the construction of socialism in the Caribbean nation. They are assembly-driven organizations envisioned as local self-governments before setting up larger networks to build the so-called Communal State.

The Communard Union's motto is "independence, commune and socialism!"

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15468

A high-level United States (US) government delegation that visited Venezuela on Saturday failed to produce an agreement with the government of Nicolás Maduro.

Citing three people familiar with the matter, Reuters reported that the US was seeking new presidential elections, a larger participation of foreign private capital in Venezuela’s oil industry and a public condemnation of Russia’s incursion into Ukraine. The Biden administration representatives reportedly offered Venezuela a temporary return to the SWIFT financial transaction system.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, who directly participated in the meeting, instead demanded broader sanctions relief and the return of foreign assets such as oil subsidiary CITGO.

Caracas had not publicly commented on the meeting at the time of writing.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15469

🎙 The sixth Venezuelanalysis' podcast episode focuses on women's struggles in Venezuela, particularly for the decriminalization of abortion and against gender violence.

Listen now! 👇

https://venezuelanalysis.com/audio/15470

On International Working Women’s Day, a number of grassroots collectives held a protest outside the attorney general’s office in the Venezuelan capital to reject sexist practices inside the country’s judicial system that revictimizes women in situations of machista violence.

“Women are killed by legal delays!” and “No more femicides!” cried out dozens of activists during the rally. The feminist groups carried a document with their demands and suggestions for the correct implementation of the 2007 Organic Law on the Right of Women to a Life Free of Violence.

“In 2020 we counted 256 cases and in 2021 we had 239. We have likewise seen a rise in trans-femicides, with six cases,” stated Venezuelan researcher Aimee Zambrano, according to the Utopix’s Femicide Monitor.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/images/15471

The Nicolás Maduro government decreed a near twentyfold salary hike.

In a public forum with trade unions on March 3, the Venezuelan president announced that the minimum wage would be set at half a Petro, some 126 bolivars (BsD) which amount to US $29 at the present exchange rate.

The new figure represents a significant increase over the previous one of 7 BsD (roughly $1.6). The government is reportedly weighing raising public employee food bonuses o 45 BsD ($10.4). They are currently set at 3 BsD.

“Wages have been our deepest wound,” Maduro said. “But we have a plan to recover salaries, all salary scales, as well as establish new collective bargaining agreements.”

The announcement came as inflation registered 2.9 percent in February, the lowest monthly figure since February 2014.

https://bit.ly/3pS6q7j

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro pledged to restart the dialogue process with the hardline opposition following a first-contact meeting with officials from the United States government.

“We have decided to reactivate the dialogue process with all political, economic, and religious sectors of the country. We are restructuring the talks to make them broader and more inclusive,” stated Maduro on Monday in a state television broadcast.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15473

Corporate media and establishment actors have led a campaign to criminalize leftist leaders by linking them to Maduro. In response, these actors have tried to circumvent these "accusations" in the most pragmatic way: attacking the Venezuelan government or, if possible, avoiding the matter altogether.

With leftist leaders winning back power in Latin America, how will they handle the "Venezuela issue"? Ociel López breaks it down.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/crisis-critique/15475

Rigel Sergent is a spokesperson for a powerful anti-eviction movement called Movimiento de Inquilinas e Inquilinos (henceforth “Inquilinos”). That movement’s parent organization is the Movimiento de Pobladoras y Pobladores (henceforth “Pobladores''), a combative Chavista platform for urban struggle, that occupies unused urban land.

Sergent has been a part of Inquilinos since its early days in 2004 and is currently a member of the National Assembly. In this interview, we ask him about tenants’ rights in Venezuela and how they have evolved over time.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/15474

Venezuelan VP Delcy Rodríguez restated the country’s readiness to enter a dialogue process with the US gov’t for economic sanctions relief while rejecting any conditions imposed by the Biden administration.

The Biden administration faced strong bipartisan criticism over recent direct talks with the Venezuelan government

News outlets reported that in light of criticism from hardline sympathizers of the Venezuelan opposition, the Biden administration had suspended its direct talks with the Venezuelan government but that a deal to lift some US sanctions in exchange for restarting oil sales to the US was still on the table.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15478

The key agricultural input for coffee growing is simply the elbow grease that family producers can provide. Yet the product is as good as gold, since it can be turned into hard currency locally, in neighboring Colombia, or in the international market. This is a clue as to why a small coffee-growing cooperative that lived through innumerable difficulties following its founding in 2004 would become the backbone of one of the country’s flagship communes.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/15477

Despite the uncertainty regarding sanctions relief, US oil giant Chevron and other PDVSA partners have continued pushing Washington to ease measures against Caracas in order to receive Venezuelan oil cargoes as debt payment. According to Reuters, Chevron is already preparing to take operating control in its four joint oil ventures in western and eastern Venezuela, which produced 200,000 bpd before sanctions were levied against the industry.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15479

A dancer, coach, and transgender rights activist, Rummie Quintero Verdú is the founder of Venezuelan Divas [Divas de Venezuela]. That longstanding organization struggles for the rights of the country’s dissident sex-gender community. In this interview, we talk about her experience growing up as a trans person in the working class 23 de Enero barrio in Caracas, and about the situation of trans people in Venezuela in general.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/15476

"The Founding Congress of the Communard Union was a space where not only the validity of the socialist horizon was reclaimed, but also the need to 'return to Chávez,' in the sense that an important part of the leadership has moved away from his ideology and praxis. More notably, it was a space in which the constant references to socialism were not just for appearances, but quite the opposite: it was about reaffirming a clear position in favor of the construction of socialism from within the territory, from the communal, from popular self-government and by strengthening social property."

In the first delivery of his new column, Reinaldo Iturriza takes stock of the recent Communard Union congress.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/politics-commons/15480

The Venezuelan government ruled out direct talks with self-proclaimed “Interim President” Juan Guaidó after National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez revealed links between the US-backed opposition figure and alleged narco trafficking kingpin Biaggio Benito Garófalo Forte.

“We are not going to meet with Juan Guaidó. We do not meet with drug traffickers. We put drug traffickers in jail,” Rodríguez told reporters Friday.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15486

"It might be that the yankee blockade will not ultimately succeed in overthrowing the government. But if along the way we surrender to the market’s whims and go back to believing that only the private sector can do things properly, is that not a defeat?"

In this delivery of "Tales of Resistance," Jessica Dos Santos talks about privatization creeping into the economy and popular consciousness.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/tales-resistance/15482

Vice President Delcy Rodríguez stated that 2021 became a “turning point” for the Venezuelan economy despite crushing US sanctions. “Our revenues reached $1.7 billion in 2022 compared to just $743 million in 2020, while oil production has continued to grow.”

On Tuesday, Rodríguez highlighted the gradual strengthening of Venezuela’s digital bolívar (BsD) which raised its value by 6 percent since July 2021, following measures to stabilize the exchange rate between the national currency and the US dollar.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15487

Now that Russia’s moves in Eastern Europe have re-ignited the ‘Great Game’ of a previous era, Venezuela, Cuba and others, though thousands of miles away, are finding themselves at the heart of the budding new Great Game.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/15488

Our latest infographic examines four integration mechanisms that re-activate Simón Bolívar's dream of a united Latin American and Caribbean region to counter US hegemony.

View the complete interactive infographic here: https://venezuelanalysis.com/images/15485

Spanish judicial authorities suspended the extradition of Venezuela’s former intelligence chief Hugo “El Pollo” Carvajal to the United States (US), where he faces drug trafficking charges.

In a statement, Spain’s National Court said it had agreed to once again suspend Carvajal’s extradition pending the outcome of his appeal to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

In March 2020, the US Justice Department indicted Carvajal of conspiring to "flood the United States with cocaine.”

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15489

The Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV) denounced the killing of a second member of the political organization in the southern border state of Apure.

“Less than three months after the murder of communist militant and popular communicator José Urbina in Apure, our comrade and PCV social leader Juan de Dios Hernández has been kidnapped and murdered,” stated the party’s secretary-general Óscar Figuera on Tuesday via Twitter.

https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/15492