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Geopolitics

Venezuela-Iran: Maduro And The Axis Of Chaos In The Americas

With the complicity of leftist rulers in Venezuela, Bolivia and even Argentina, Iran's sanction-ridden regime is spreading its tentacles in South America, and could even undermine democracies.

Photo of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro visiting Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran, Iran on June 11. Venezuela is one of Iran's closest allies, and both are subject to tough U.S. sanctions.

Maduro visiting Raisi in Tehran on June 11.

Julio Borges

-Analysis-

CARACASThe dangers posed by Venezuela's relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran is something we've warned about before. Though not new, the dangers have changed considerably in recent years.

They began under Venezuela's late leader, Hugo Chávez , when he decided to turn his back on the West and move closer to countries outside our geopolitical sphere. In 2005, Chávez and Iran's then president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, signed collaborative agreements in areas beyond the economy, with goals that included challenging the West and spreading Iran's presence in Latin America.


That never immediately yielded initiatives, but in the past three years Chávez's successor, Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro, has breathed new life into the ties as part of his bid to retain power at any cost.

Refineries and supermarkets

To get a glance of the depth of Maduro's relations with Iran, one need only see the Iranians now busy repairing refineries, guiding sanction-evading policies, exerting undue influence on the defense sector and even opening supermarkets in Caracas.

Iranians showed Venezuela their prototype for a rocket-launching drone.

Their presence in Venezuela as a consequential political actor is real, and certainly related to Maduro's trip earlier in June to the Middle East, which included a stop in Tehran to meet with the regime's top leaders. After the meetings, the Iranian and Venezuelan presidents held a press conference to announce the agreements signed in the visit, though strangely, said nothing about defense, where Iran has gained relevance.

As late as 2021 the Iranians were reported to have shown Venezuela their prototype for a rocket-launching drone.

Maduro's trip to Tehran also coincided with a disturbing report on a suspicious plane landing in Argentina, with a crew of 14 Venezuelans and five Iranians. The plane and its departure point have raised all manner of questions, but information confirmed in Argentina so far suggests it was a grave threat to hemispheric security.

The plane in question

Firstly, we know it was owned by Mahan Air, an Iranian carrier previously sanctioned for taking arms and supplies to extremists or militants in the Middle East. Five months ago, this plane was transferred to Conviasa, an airline owned by the Venezuelan regime and also subject to sanctions.

Secondly, at least one of the crew members was duly identified as a member of the Quds Force, a commando unit of the Iranian Revolutionary guards. The group are listed as active collaborators of international terrorism.

The plane was reported to have travelled to Uruguay to refuel before returning to Venezuela, but Uruguay's government banned it from its airspace following information it had received on its movements. Its flight path was anything but anodyne, having stopped in Ciudad del Este in Paraguay, a hotbed of continental crime and trafficking, and suspected operating zone for Hezbollah, the Lebanese terror group long linked to the Iranian regime.

Argentina's investigation

The Argentine judiciary is now investigating the plane, and its crew and suspect connections. As Argentina has already suffered the terrorism of Iran-linked elements in the past, this incident cannot be underestimated. Faced with a threat to the peace and security of Argentines, the government of President Alberto Fernández should fully probe the plane's mission. Did elements in the Argentine government know about it, its crew members and foreign ties? The public has a right to know and must force the Argentine authorities to provide plausible explanations.

The anti-Western powers are working on a new order.

Unfortunately, Fernández, like his Mexican counterpart, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has become an unstinting apologist for Maduro. With a conniving, cynical and inhumane discourse, Fernández has whitewashed dictatorial practices and state violence exerted by Maduro and certain other strongmen.

Still, one thing is ideological sympathies, and another the security of Argentines and the region's inhabitants.

Maduro's relations with Iran have acquired another dimension. It is no longer about Right and Left and who is right, but about the future of Western, liberal-democratic values in our region. The anti-Western powers are working on a new order, and regional democracies should see the Argentine affair as an alarm bell.

For such incidents will surreptitiously undermine security until it is blown up, as it was in the Middle East. Maduro has become a firm ally of anti-Western powers like Russia, China, Cuba and Iran. And they are using him as their foothold to destabilize the region. It is time to draw a line and thwart Maduro's spiraling ties with this axis of chaos.

*Borges is a member of the Venezuelan opposition, a former legislator and co-founder of the Justice First party.

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Ideas

The Unifying Power Of Art In A World Divided By Religion And Morality

Political battle lines are becoming increasingly entrenched, and opposing views are being pushed towards ever greater extremes. Language has become a battlefield. If morality pushes us apart, and religion does not help in the process, we may find a solution in our sense of humanity, writes German psychiatrist Manfred Lütz in Die Welt.

The Unifying Power Of Art In A World Divided By Religion And Morality

Eugène Delacroix - La liberté guidant le peuple (1830). Commemorates the French Revolution of 1830, also known as the July Revolution.

Manfred Lütz

-Essay-

BERLIN — In the Middle Ages, people didn’t read texts about the meaning of life. Most of them couldn’t read at all, and they saw the meaning of life in the images in their churches. Academics have recently started speaking about the “iconic turn”, the return of images, and it is true that the Instagram generation prefers to communicate visually. Could pictures offer a way for our deeply divided society to come together once again?

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Both in terms of foreign and domestic policy, political views are becoming increasingly entrenched, and on both sides of the debate, opposing views are being pushed towards ever greater extremes. In the world of today, many people are cut off from any contact with those who think differently, living in echo chambers, surrounded by people who confirm their worldview. When those who disagree with their position condemn them from a moral perspective, this only serves to vitalize the group under attack.

The public pillorying that dominates social media can be a cause of great anxiety for individuals. But for those who feel they are part of a community, their fear often transforms into an aggressive form of self-defense. The topic itself isn’t as important as the sense of being attacked.

That is a possible psychological explanation for a strange phenomenon, whereby attacks on groups such as the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and some of their individual members have strengthened the sense of community within these groups and brought together a surprising mix of people, from radical free marketeers to nationalists, conspiracy theorists, pro-lifers, COVID deniers, right-wing extremists, conservative Christians and racists.

They are united by a single experience, that of being excluded. Conversations within these groups are reminiscent of chats around a pub table: the more harshly someone criticizes “those in power”, “the lefties”, “right-wingers” or even, “the others”, the more likes they get.

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