Is Venezuela seeking closer ties with Iran? It looks like it, but I'm personally not real concerned. If Iran wants to sink money into the black hole that is Venezuela, that's their business.
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Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro made room in his high-pressure agenda to receive Iran’s foreign minister over the weekend, and he made sure the meeting was broadcast on national TV.
Maduro gave Mohammad Javad Zarif a warm welcome in the Presidential Palace of Miraflores. They shook hands as they announced an alliance to stabilize oil prices.
“We continue to build common ground and a new consensus on stabilizing oil markets, strengthening industries, strengthening OPEC, to strengthen the closeness and alliance with the production countries of OPEC,” said Maduro as he greeted Zarif, the highest-ranking Iranian official that has visited Venezuela since 2013.
Political analysts here say the encounter was a political show aimed in part at irritating the United States, repeatedly pointed at by the socialist government as conspirator to overturn the regime. A partnership between the two countries is sure to infuriate Washington because it shows Iran’s influence in Latin America, the U.S.’ neighbor, is growing....
Others downplayed the visit.
“The political air has changed in Latin America and the Bolivarian influence is fading quickly. Countries like Argentina, Brasil and Paraguay are no longer part of that alliance,” said Milos Alcalay, former Venezuelan ambassador to the UN, to FNL.
The diplomat said Maduro’s statements on Saturday are more part of a political show than a real game changer for Venezuela.
“All the companies built between Venezuela and Iran in the past have been a complete failure and that will not change in the future. Now both countries are facing crises of their own and Teheran doesn’t really have resources to help Venezuela’s economy,” the former ambassador told FNL....
