I’m in Bolivia with a @codepink delegation to observe Sunday’s elections. Spent most of the day with the OEP (Plurinational Electoral Body – highest election authority) where they explained the process. The DIREPRE system raised alarms.

Thread DIREPRE = System for disseminating preliminary results; it’s basically a non-binding quick count designed to give the media and citizens an idea of how the results are going. Last year’s system was called TREP; this system has since been “updated”

Elections haven’t happened and already US politicians are calling it fraudulent. No, I don’t mean @realdonaldtrump and November, this time its @senatormenendez and Venezuela’s December legislative elections. Topic is now gold mining. Seems like it would be easier for Venezuela to clamp down on illegal gold mining if the US hadn’t sanctioned its gold sector in 2018. Maybe it would be a bigger security priority for Vzla if the US wasn’t threatening to invade.

The raid by the mercenaries and deserters was doomed to fail, not because it was idiotic or dumb, but because the Venezuelan extremist opposition in Colombia has been infiltrated by Venezuelan intelligence services for years and the government knew it was coming in advance. That the mercenaries were caught and made mistakes should not detract from the seriousness of what they were trying to do. The captured Americans say their plan was to kidnap President Maduro, take control of the airport and wait for a plane.