The US, supported by Brazil, fails in its attempt to suspend Venezuela from the OAS.

Fania Rodrigues, Brazil of Fact - The United States suffered a political defeat during the Organization of American States (OAS) assembly on Tuesday (5), failing to suspend Venezuela's participation in the international body.

To suspend the Caribbean nation – which announced in 2017 that it would no longer participate in the OAS of its own accord – 24 votes would be needed (out of a total of 34).

However, the resolution proposed by US Vice President Mike Pence only garnered 19 votes. Another 11 countries chose to abstain (including Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Uruguay).

Venezuela, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Bolivia, and Dominica voted against the resolution.

The resolution presented by Pence accused Venezuela of violating the organization's Constitution due to an alleged lack of democracy, and called for "urgent interventions."

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza pointed out that the resolution presented by the US manipulated the citation of the democratic clause of the OAS Constitution.

"In this resolution against Venezuela, they mutilated a section of the OAS Charter that states that everything must be done within the principle of non-intervention. They left part of the wording identical: 'to promote and consolidate representative democracy.' But they removed the part that says: 'within the principle of non-intervention,'" denounced the Venezuelan minister during his speech at the OAS.

Invalid decision

During the OAS session, the 19 countries that voted against Venezuela approved a resolution repudiating the presidential elections of May 20th.

Although not a suspension, the decision would pave the way for such a measure, had Venezuela not already announced that this is the last meeting of the mechanism in which it participates.

Lacking the 24 votes needed to approve the resolution that would suspend Venezuela, the US, Brazil, and Argentina—who were leading the push—removed the references to articles 20 and 21 of the Inter-American Democratic Charter.

The latter refers to suspending a country where there has been a "democratic breakdown" - and it was used twice, in 1962 against Cuba, and in 2009 against the coup that overthrew Manuel Zelaya in Honduras.

Without those points, the resolution was approved.

Cuba's participation in the organization has been accepted again, however, the island's government has decided to abstain from meetings since then.

According to the Venezuelan foreign minister, manipulating the text of the OAS Constitution was necessary because, otherwise, the original text itself would have rendered the resolution null and void.

"I understand, I put myself in your shoes. If you had included the full text of the democratic clause, respecting the OAS Charter, you could not have approved the resolution against Venezuela, because it would be absolutely invalid," Jorge Arreaza emphasized.

In addition to the legal aspects, the minister also pointed to the political issues that are allegedly behind the censorship against Venezuela.

"The US has been engaged in a continuous coup against Venezuela for over 20 years. In the 2002 coup against President Hugo Chávez, the US recognized the coup leader. The images show the US ambassador at the presidential palace on that April 11th," Arreaza emphasized.

Caracas sees victory

Venezuela had already formally requested the withdrawal of this organization in April 2017.

This exit process will be completed in April 2019. Precisely for this reason, President Nicolás Maduro announced on Monday (4) that this would be the last OAS session in which Venezuelan representatives would participate.

After the US defeat, Minister Jorge Arreaza said that "Venezuela leaves the OAS General Assembly with its head held high."

Venezuela's Minister of Communication, Jorge Rodríguez, celebrated.

"Venezuelan victory. They've had the same 19 votes for two years now."

"Not even with all the pressure could Pence bring down American dignity," he wrote on his Twitter account.

The president of the National Constituent Assembly, Delcy Rodríguez, also commented on the result announced Tuesday night. "Bolívar's sword broke the imperial siege against Venezuela. The US government launched all kinds of pressure and threats to attack the Venezuelan people. Latin American and Caribbean honor prevailed against the lackeys of neoliberalism," the constituent deputy said on Twitter.