by RODRIGO DURAO COELHO
The historian and political analyst analyses some of the world’s main political events
One of the main topics of international news at the beginning of the new year is likely to be Donald Trump’s comeback to the White House. Even before taking up a new term heading the US, he has been causing controversy with a variety of threats: from “resolving” the Ukraine war in 24 hours, to the mass deportation of millions of migrants and seizing the Panama Canal.
One of his main threats is to surcharge products from other countries, in theory, to benefit US production. Punishing countries that stop using the US dollar for commercial transactions with sanctions is another variant of this threat.
“By now, 70% of developing countries around the world have US sanctions. What are they going to do? Sanction 100% of them? That would isolate the United States. I think we have to take some of these threats by Trump with a little less seriousness,” said Prashad.
To Indian historian Vijay Prashad, one of today’s most important Marxist thinkers, although he points out that the new US government must be terrible news for most nations, the billionaire’s threats shouldn’t be taken so seriously.
The Indian thinker was the last guest of BdF Entrevista in 2024. In the conversation, he reviews some of the main issues that were highlighted in the last year in the international news, such as the Venezuelan election and the US, the rise of the far right, the war in Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza, as well as climate change and artificial intelligence.
Watch the full interview (in English) and read the main topics below:
I’d like to take you through some of the most important events of 2024 that have made international news, starting with Venezuela. We had the election in Venezuela, whose result was contested by the opposition and by foreign countries, including the US and the European Union. What did you think?
The first thing I’d say is that countries that are in a situation of near war or war, it’s very difficult for them to hold an election. The immense sanctions campaign on Venezuela is effectively a war.
And I think it would be appropriate for the government to have held back on the election, frankly. There are enough experiences around the world to know that, when there is a situation like this, [it’s] very difficult to hold an election. The state apparatus was not working at full capacity, people are suffering and struggling, so many people have migrated out of the country.
The sheer fact that a million of people have migrated out of Venezuela calls into question the ability of the Venezuelans to hold an election. So many of their embassies are understaffed and so on. Nonetheless, Venezuela went ahead with the election. Part of the reason for the election was the Barbados Agreement that the Venezuelan government have made with the opposition, brokered by the United States.
The US is desperate to get Venezuelan oil into Europe. Because of the sanctions on Russia, Europe is struggling to find energy. In fact, during 2022, the United States committed France and Italy to buy petroleum from Venezuela. There was a real hope that if the Barbados Agreement held, then Venezuelan il could enter Europe.
The election was, again, contested. It is always contested. The opposition has contested the election from the beginning of the Chávez era. That was to be expected. But then, the reaction of different countries was a little surprising. If the Europeans are desperate for Venezuelan oil, why would they then contest the election?
Particularly because they keep to trying to violate Venezuela’s sovereignty, saying, “Where are the papers? Show as the papers!” and so on. There is no obligation in Venezuela for anything to be published. In fact, the opposition candidate has to go to the government agency, the Central Election Council, and ask for a challenge. They never did because the opposition candidate [Edmundo González] ran off to Spain very shortly thereafter.
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