MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Foreign Ministers of Iran and Venezuela ratify partnership

“We reaffirmed the solid friendship between our countries,” Gil stressed

The Foreign Ministers of Venezuela, Yván Gil, and Iran, Abbas Araghchi, held a telephone conversation during which their countries' willingness to expand bilateral cooperation.

“We had a conversation with the Iranian Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, in which we reaffirmed the solid friendship between our countries and ratified the cooperation agreements in force with a view to exploring new areas,” Gil said on social media. “Araghchi conveyed to us the Iranian government's support to Venezuela in the face of the current wave of aggressions that seek to destabilize our country,” he added regarding the controversy following the July 28 elections President Nicolás Maduro announced to have won albeit without producing any documentation supporting these claims.

Venezuela and Iran maintain close bilateral relations under the principle of complementarity for joint development, local media explained. Their alliance is focused on tourism, food, defense, oil, gas, petrochemicals, science and technology, health, culture, and transport.

In the aftermath of the presidential elections, Venezuela held a popular consultation across some 4,500 communes this past weekend to decide on projects of interest for the citizenry to be sponsored by Caracas. It was the second such process in the country after the one on April 21.

National Communal Electoral Commission Chairwoman Carolina Arellano underlined the massive participation of Venezuelans in the direct democracy event where anyone over the age of 15 can vote. Arellano also pointed out that at least 120 observers from Europe, the United States, Africa, and Latin America had participated in the process, which was marred only by some rain at various polling stations in the morning.

A total of 27,420 projects were approved out of 103,000. They are focused on drinking water, roads, housing, electricity, health, education, sewage, productive units, environment, and public transport, among other issues. The projects are submitted through popular assemblies. Then, the members of the communes vote for the prioritized projects and collectively supervise their execution and the use of the funds provided by the Venezuelan State to finance them.