Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has responded to the latest threats to Venezuela's sovereignty from US President Donald Trump, in which the US leader promised "swift and strong actions" if Venezuela decides to proceed with the July 30 elections for a National Constituent Assembly.
“The United States will not stand by as Venezuela crumbles,” Trump said in a White House statement on July 17.
Maduro called Trump's threats "vulgar", TeleSUR English reported. He said: "The process of the constituent assembly is already in the hands of the people who will exercise their right to vote. This is my response, the constituent assembly does not belong to me.
Venezuela's Foreign Ministry issued the following statement in response to Trump.
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The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela rejects the unbelievable statement published today by the White House on July 17, 2017.
It is a document of a sort that has never been seen before, which, due to its poor level and awful quality, makes it difficult to intellectually understand the intentions of the assailant country.
Without a doubt, the government of the United States is used to humiliating other nations in its international relations and believes that it will receive as a response the subordination to which they are accustomed.
The trench that the government of the United States is digging in its relations with Venezuela makes it difficult for the entire international community to rationally predict its actions.
The government of the United States, unashamedly, shows its absolute bias towards the violent and extremist sectors of Venezuelan politics, which favour the use of terrorism to overthrow a popular and democratic government.
The moral ruin of the Venezuelan opposition has dragged President Trump to commit an open aggression against a Latin American country. We do not know who could have written, let alone authorised, a statement with such a conceptual and moral poverty.
The thin democratic veil of the Venezuelan opposition has fallen, and it has revealed the brutal interventionist force of the US government, which has been behind the violence suffered by the Venezuelan people in the last four months.
It is not the first time that we have denounced and confronted threats as ludicrous as those contained in this unbelievable document.
We call on the peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as on the free peoples of the world, to understand the magnitude of the brutal threat contained in this imperial statement and to defend sovereignty, self-determination and independence, fundamental principles of international law.
The original constituent power is contemplated in our Constitution and it only concerns the Venezuelan people. The National Constituent Assembly will be elected by a direct, universal and secret ballot of all Venezuelans, under the authority of the National Electoral Council, as contemplated in our legal framework.
It is an act of political sovereignty of the Republic, and nothing and no one can stop it. The Constituent Assembly will go on!
Today, Venezuelan people are free and will respond united against the insolent threat posed by a xenophobic and racist empire.
The anti-imperialist thought of the Liberator is more valid than ever: “The United States seems destined by Providence to plague America with misery in the name of liberty” - Simon Bolivar.