“The first ships that arrived on our Caribbean coasts came to bring us under control,” said Yvan Gil Pinto, Venezuela’s Minister of the People's Power for Foreign Affairs, noting that this was the beginning of a long struggle of resistance against colonialism.  Three centuries later, the liberating army — made of Black people, Indigenous people, white people and mestizos — rose up to free South America.  Venezuela is a country “that learned to struggle for its own destiny”, he said, recalling the early twentieth-century coup d’état against General Cipriano Castro, financed by oil companies and the United States Government, followed by puppet Governments that plunged Venezuela into repression for decades. But in 1999, the Venezuelan people led by Commander Hugo Chávez, carried out a peaceful and democratic revolution.  Today, Venezuela’s emancipation project, as reaffirmed by multiple electoral events, is led by President Nicolás Maduro, he said.

“War has been waged upon us in many forms,” he said.  Condemning the “regime change” aggressions against his country over the past decade, the 1,042 sanctions imposed on it and “now an absolutely illegal and completely immoral military threat”, he denounced this attempt to bring war to the Caribbean and South America.  Thanking the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), BRICS (Brazil, Russian Federation, India and China) and the Non-Aligned Movement for their solidarity, he said the United States is targeting Venezuela’s incalculable oil and gas wealth.  The people of the United States have also been betrayed by their Governments who are waging war instead of solving the poverty, inequality and unemployment that characterize that country.

Reaffirming Venezuela’s right to defend its sovereignty, he said his country will work towards a multipolar world without colonial empires.  Recalling President Chavez’s founding of Petrocaribe, the Union of South American Nations and Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), he said: “We are not intimidated by threats, lies or cannons.”  He also expressed solidarity with the heroic people of Palestine, condemned the attacks on Iran, and demanded the lifting of the blockade on Cuba and the removal of unilateral coercive measures against Belarus, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Eritrea, Iran and Zimbabwe.  Venezuela has never been a threat to any nation, he said, adding that it will continue to work toward a world where colonialism and slavery are vanquished forever and where humanity can be human.