Subject: Morning Brief: United States recognizes Juan Guaidó as interim president of Venezuela
From: "Foreign Policy" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Jan 2019 08:18:32 -0600 (CST)

United States Recognizes Juan Guaidó as Interim President of Venezuela

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MORNING BRIEF

Today's Global News from Foreign Policy

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01/24/2019

01/24/2019

TOP NEWS

United States Recognizes Juan Guaidó as Interim President of Venezuela

Top News: As anti-government protesters took to the streets across Venezuela on Wednesday, Juan Guaidó, the leader of the country’s National Assembly, declared himself interim president. The United States, along with Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Peru, and others countries in the region, quickly backed Guaidó.

Nicolás Maduro—who assumed office as president of Venezuela after the death of Hugo Chávez in 2013, and whose reelection last year was condemned as illegitimate by both the political opposition and much of the international community—rejected the claim and broke off diplomatic relations with the United States, giving diplomats 72 hours to leave the country.

“The United States does not recognize the Maduro regime as the government of Venezuela,” U.S. Secretary of Stake Mike Pompeo said in a statement. “Accordingly the United States does not consider former president Nicolás Maduro to have the legal authority to break diplomatic relations with the United States or to declare our diplomats persona non grata.”

Maduro retains the support of longtime partners, including Bolivia, Cuba, China, and Russia.

“What this will come down is whether the momentum being created today creates the necessary fissures in the military so that Maduro loses that critical base of support,” Jason Marczak, an expert on Latin America with the Atlantic Council, told Foreign Policy.

Indonesia: Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama, the former governor of Jakarta, Indonesia, was freed from prison early, after serving more than a year and a half behind bars on a blasphemy conviction. His imprisonment in 2017—in the wake of a protest movement sparked by an edited viral video in which he made a joke during a campaign stop that some took as an insult to Islam—was widely seen as a test case for secular pluralism and tolerance in Indonesian politics.

“His imprisonment was a loud wake-up call for many Indonesians,” Andreas Harsono, a Jakarta-based researcher for Human Rights Watch, told Foreign Policy in 2017. “There is a serious problem of religious freedom and discrimination against minorities in Indonesia.”

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AFRICA

•  Prosecutors in South Africa provisionally withdrew corruption charges against Duduzane Zuma, the son of former President Jacob Zuma.

•  In Zimbabwe, residents of Harare, the capital, accused soldiers of beating people on the streets.

•  Nigerian presidential candidate Obiageli Ezekwesili withdrew from the race in order to focus on building an alternative to the major parties.

AMERICAS

•  U.S. President Donald Trump said “all options are on the table” when it comes to the prospect of U.S. intervention in Venezuela.

•  Brazil’s new far-right government revealed plans to privatize the Trans-Amazonian Highway, a road that cuts through nearly 2,000 miles of rainforest.

•  Mexico said it would not allow the United States to send at-risk asylum seekers back across the border.

ASIA

•  Flash floods in southern Sulawesi, Indonesia, left at least 26 people dead.

•  Singapore sought to settle an ongoing border and airspace dispute with Malaysia.

•  Police in Papua New Guinea asked the public to help track down an accused pirate named Tommy Baker because their patrol boat broke down six years ago and was never fixed or replaced.

EUROPE

•  Former Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond was arrested Thursday on unknown charges.

•  European Commission documents reviewed by Politico Europe showed a concerted effort by Facebook over the course of four years to push back against European moves to regulate the company.

•  The yellow vest protest movement in France began putting forward candidates for May’s European Parliament elections.

MIDDLE EAST

•  In its crackdown on dissent last year, Iran arrested some 7,000 people, according to Amnesty International.

•  Saudi Arabia announced plans to host its own running of the bulls.

•  Qatar is set to increase aid to the Gaza Strip.

- By Benjamin Soloway

(Federico Parra/AFP/Getty Images)

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