Colombian leader urges Maduro to release detailed Venezuelan vote counts

Colombian President Gustavo Petro has called on his close ally, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, to release detailed vote counts of the weekend election in which authorities declared him the winner.

Mr Petro’s comments followed harsh criticism from the international community of Mr Maduro and his ruling party-loyal National Electoral Council, which is yet to release any polling centre-level results as it has done in previous elections.

Mr Maduro’s biggest challenger, Edmundo Gonzalez, and opposition leader Maria Corina Machado said the release of those figures would show the President lost the election.

“The serious doubts that have arisen around the Venezuelan electoral process can lead its people to a deep violent polarisation with serious consequences of permanent division,” Mr Petro said in a post on X.

“I invite the Venezuelan government to allow the elections to end in peace, allowing a transparent vote count, with the counting of votes, and with the supervision of all the political forces of its country and professional international supervision,” he added.

Mr Petro also proposed that Mr Maduro’s government and the opposition reach an agreement “that allows for the maximum respect of the (political) force that has lost the elections”. The agreement could be submitted to the United Nations Security Council, he said.

The Carter Centre, an independent US-based institution that evaluates elections, said late on Tuesday it was unable to verify the results of Venezuela’s presidential election on Sunday, blaming authorities for a “complete lack of transparency” in declaring Mr Maduro the winner without providing any individual polling tallies.

The group was authorised earlier this year by Venezuela’s electoral authorities to send experts to observe the election. It had 17 experts spread out in four cities on Sunday.

“The electoral authority’s failure to announce disaggregated results by polling station constitutes a serious breach of electoral principles,” the Carter Centre said, adding that the election did not meet international standards and “cannot be considered democratic”.