We have spoken about this several times but this week Newsweek called out all those international organizations the globalists are so fond of. In a scathing piece regarding the situation in Venezuela the headliner read “The international organizations tasked with addressing human rights violations have largely failed to act”. How bad is it? Human Rights Watch reported that between 2016 -2019 the Maduro regime executed 20,000 individuals for “resistance to authority”. We’ve mentioned it before but it’s worth repeating. During his 17 years in power in Chile, Pinochet, executed about 3,000 people and everyone was horrified,and rightfully so. Why do they not seem so horrified by the Maduro regime killing 20,000 in just a few years?

 Newsweek continued… ICC Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda (a Maduro sympathizer) promised to launch an investigation and never did. Then in 2018 a group of six countries implored Bensouda to investigate the Maduro regime’s human rights violations and crimes against humanity. Still nothing. When the OAS (Organization of American States) reprimanded the ICC for failing to investigate, Bensouda admitted there was “a reasonable basis” to believe the reports of Venezuela’s crimes. Still nothing. Now that Bensouda is gone maybe new Chief Prosecutor,Karim Khan, will finally do something. (That’s a big ‘maybe’)

 What about the ICJ (International Court of Justice)? Their problem is two fold. First, they can’t act until another sovereign state formally files charges which,to date, nobody has. The ICJ did recently call out the regime in the form of a reprimand but that’s about it. Second, the ICJ has no enforcement mechanism so Venezuela (Maduro) can simply ignore them even if the prosecution is successful. Huh?

 Then there’s the Inter-American Council of Human Rights headquartered in Costa Rica. They can hold a tribunal but,again, they lack a supranational authority to enforce.

 How about the UN? Aren’t they the ones with the “High Commissioner on Human Rights”, Michele Bachelet? Oh, that’s right…after two years and several scathing reports they’re still looking for an office in Caracas. Maybe that’s because in the irony of all ironies the Maduro regime has a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, not to mention the Maduro regime’s allies,Russia and China can block UN efforts to do anything. And lest we forget, in 2005 all members of the UN endorsed the UN Responsibility To Protect. Listed among the key concerns in the UN RTP is crimes against humanity which is among the litany of accusations against the Maduro regime. There seem to be plenty of reprimands and condemnation against Maduro and his cadre but no action.What’s next…Super Double Secret Probation? (It’s always a good time to get in an ‘Animal House’ reference)

 This next one is a teaser for next week’s Venezuela : Down The Rabbit Hole chapter “El Dorado”.Yale Environment 360 reports that since 2016 when Maduro announced “The Mining Arc” the government/military has controlled more than 900 mining sites and works with FARC and ELN rebels to smuggle the wealth out of the country bypassing the country’s treasury (the people). They referenced a great film title, “The Mining Arc : Ecocide or Suicide”. More on this next week.

 In case you thought the crisis at our Southern border was just impacting the US border check this out. CNN reports that the back-up is being felt all the way down in Necoli,Colombia. There is a ferry at Necoli which carries passengers across to where they can enter Panama and join the migrant caravans headed up to the US. Venezuelan migrants,as well as people from all over Latin America and Africa are causing quite the bottleneck. There is now a two week wait time for the ferry as more and more migrants pile into the area.

 And how about this from PunchNG (Nigeria). The Nigerians are becoming concerned about the devaluation of the naira (local currency). The article referenced Zimbabwe and Venezuela. The Nigerians have a long way to go to get in Venezuela’s class regarding devaluation and inflation. We’ve covered this before but it bears repeating. Since Maduro came to power he has lopped off 5 zeros from the currency and is about to lop off 6 more. Venezuela is currently in it’s fourth year of hyperinflation and soon will be in it’s fifth. To put this into context, of the 56 incidents of hyperinflation on record almost all of them have lasted no more than a year or so. The notable exceptions are Greece from 1941-1945 and Nicaragua from 1986-1991. Look out! The Venezuelans are coming for the record of the longest period of hyperinflation in history!

 As a follow up, Sputnik News reports it’s official,effective October 1st Venezuela will launch it’s “Digital Bolivar” removing six zeros from it’s currency in other words all monetary sums will be divided by one million. So let me get this straight. You take a pre Chavismo bolivar and divide by 1,000 to get a bolivare fuerte then you divide by 100,000 to get a bolivare soberano then divide by 1,000,000 to get a digital bolivar. Fourteen zeros huh?

 And we have some happy talk from the Syrian Observer. Venezuela’s ambassador to Syria announced that when the war is over Venezuela stands ready to participate in Syria’s reconstruction. I’m sure that’s comforting to them.

 Also on the lighter side we have TVES (Venezuela Government TV) airing an interview with the Director of the National Institute of Sports. In a rare candid moment the director related the terrible conditions under which Venezuela Olympians train. The interviewer freaked out and interrupted the director and it was all caught on live TV…hilarious!

 There was a thought provoking article put out there by The Wilson Center, “Venezuela’s Authoritarian Allies”. Aside from the usual suspects they also talked about non-authoritarian India. Over the last five years they have purchased $26 billion in crude oil from the Maduro regime. I can’t blame India for acting in it’s own self interest but this is important for this reason. The US was, until the sanctions came into the picture, Venezuela’s number one trading partner and more importantly one of the few that actually paid for their oil. The lion’s share of Venezuela’s exports, to Cuba and China, generate no revenue. Recently about the only paying customer has been India although in the last year or two it hasn’t really been as important because the Chavistas weren’t hardly producing any oil. Just thinkin’….

 That’ll do it ’til Monday when we get into “El Dorado”.

 Have a great weekend!