Caracas, June 28, 2024.- The President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro Moros, reaffirmed the firm commitment of brotherhood with the Honduran people and with the process of change led by President Xiomara Castro.

“From Venezuela, I want to send our love, solidarity, and firm commitment of the Bolivarian Revolution, the people of Simón Bolívar, the people of Hugo Chávez to the process of change of the Honduran people, to President Xiomara Castro,” he expressed.

The message from the Venezuelan President was presented by Manuel Zelaya during the second edition of the forum of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, CELAC Social 2024, in the context of the 15th anniversary of the coup d’état in Honduras during the mandate of former President Manuel (Mel) Zelaya.

“That June 28th, 2009, when a criminal blow tried to kill President Mel Zelaya and snatched democracy and the rights of the Honduran people”, President Maduro said, detailing that during his time as Foreign Minister, he was instructed to rescue the former Honduran president.

“Commander Hugo Chávez told me: Send the Vice Minister for Latin America, Commander Francisco Arias Cárdenas, with a plane immediately to Costa Rica to rescue Mel Zelaya. And I did it (…) -Zelaya- was in the middle of a press conference, Commander Arias Cárdenas appeared and rescued him because he was kidnapped, almost killed, and taken out in a criminal way, kidnapped from his own country” he emphasized.

He also praised the rebellious and courageous character of Zelaya, who “boarded the plane from Venezuela, the ALBA plane -Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America-People’s Trade Treaty- and went to Nicaragua and that’s where this whole process began: Presidential meetings, we went to the OAS-Organization of American States-, we went to the UN-United Nations-“, while praising the resistance of the Honduran people against the dictatorship imposed.

“The popular resistance in the streets for days, weeks, months, I believe it is the most exemplary and longest popular resistance movement known against a dictatorship in the history of Latin America and the Caribbean” he highlighted.

The Venezuelan Head of State detailed the path that the Honduran people went through until reaching “the candidacy of Comrade Xiomara Castro, the fraud against Xiomara and against the resistance, and then the victory, that victory that always belonged to the people of Honduras” he added.