Our embassy has in fact tried to bring people together. The Venezuelan people are highly polarized on the Chavez government: there are those who support him and those who oppose him. The two groups are quite uncompromising in their stand.
For example, we are trying to bring people together around a table to hold discussions in the Venezuelan Congress. We are trying to avoid politicization of each and every activity or point of view. We are making efforts to build bridges and establish dialogue between political parties. Several embassies are supporting these efforts, the goal being to reduce tensions between groups. We are also striving to reinforce civil society’s action so it is not isolated when facing the government.
We are asking the government to be open and to accept comments and criticism from non-political groups. However, the government believes that these non-governmental groups are affiliated with certain political parties. We do not believe this to be true. Criticism from civil society groups is considered as political action. This is not fair. We emphasize openness when these kinds of comments are made because this is part of democracy.