Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Wednesday that he was not a ‘dictator,’ but a ‘modest man’.
“I don’t care that people call me a dictator. Those who say I’m a dictator can go to hell. I know who I am — a modest man, brought up on the basis of trade unionism and the values of Simon Bolivar. I could have never been a dictator,” Maduro said, as quoted by the daily Excelsior.
Representatives from the US authorities, as well as Colombian president and the head of the Organisation of American States, have called Maduro a ‘dictator,’ as the majority of North and South American countries have not recognized the results of the presidential election held in Venezuela in May.
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that US President Donald Trump was expected to add Venezuela to the US list of state sponsors of terrorism.
On 1 November Trump informed US lawmakers that he had signed an executive order to impose sweeping new sanctions on Venezuela’s gold exports.
Trump said that the measure came in response to the efforts of Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro’s government to plunder his country’s wealth for their own ‘corrupt purposes’.
For years, Venezuela has been living in a state of a political and economic crisis that was worsened by a decline in oil prices and sanctions introduced by the United States.
Article originally appeared on Today Venezuela and is republished here with permission.
