US rejects new Venezuela election plan
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WASHINGTON - Venezuela's planned presidential election undermines the oil exporter's democratic constitutional order and the results will not be accepted as legitimate, a senior US State Department official said on Thursday.
The official, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said the possibility of new US economic sanctions against Venezuela was always under consideration in response to the situation in the country.
Venezuela's presidential election race has begun with favorite and incumbent Nicolas Maduro signaling a nationalist, "anti-Trump" campaign while his demoralized foes scramble to find a viable candidate for a vote they predict will be unfair.
Critics of the 55-year-old Maduro, who succeeded Hugo Chavez in 2013, say he has ruined a once prosperous oil economy, turned Venezuela into a dictatorship and skewed the election system to perpetuate power for his Socialist Party.
Foes accuse Maduro of turning the OPEC nation into a dictatorship, while he says he is the victim of a US-led right-wing conspiracy to eliminate socialism -- a view that the US official rejected.
