MADRID (Reuters) – Venezuelan opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez will speak remotely with the foreign ministers of the 27 European Union member states on Thursday in Brussels, Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said.
Gonzalez, a 74-year-old former diplomat, ran against current Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in a presidential election last month that was not transparent according to the opposition, some Western countries and international bodies like a United Nations panel of experts.
“Edmundo Gonzalez will connect today to give us his point of view,” Albares told reporters ahead of a meeting with EU foreign affairs ministers in Brussels.
“It is a request that was made to me personally and that I conveyed to the high representative (Josep Borrell) and that I supported,” Albares added.
Venezuela’s electoral council and its top court have proclaimed Maduro, in power since 2013, as the winner of the July 28 election, but has not published complete voting tallies.
Venezuela’s opposition has published its own tallies on an opposition website showing a resounding victory for Gonzalez, giving him 67% support.
Borrell has repeatedly urged the release of voting records, the end of political persecution and dialogue between opponents, prompting Maduro to criticize him during rallies.
Albares has said Spain would not recognize the results of the election so long as the voting records are not released.
Gonzalez is being investigated for incitement and other crimes by Attorney General Tarek Saab, has ignored two summons to testify about the opposition website where voting tallies have been posted. Saab said on Wednesday he will issue a third summons for opposition leader.
The ruling party officials have accused the opposition of promoting violence.
Protests since the vote have led to at least 27 deaths. Human rights group Foro Penal says some 1,780 people are being held as political prisoners, including 114 adolescents. Several opposition leaders have been detained.
(Reporting by Inti Landauro and Emma Pinedo, editing by Hugh Lawson, William Maclean)
