Nicolás Maduro said that Edmundo González asked him for “clemency” to leave Venezuela and called him a “coward”

Nicolás Maduro again attacked Edmundo González Urrutia on Thursday, the opposition presidential candidate who claims to have received the most votes in the elections and who is now exiled in Spain. After González said that the Chavista regime had coerced him into allowing him to leave the country, Maduro called him a “coward” and said that the opposition candidate had asked him to “clemency” before traveling to Spain.

“In the end, I feel sorry for you, Mr. González Urrutia, who asked me for mercy, that you do not keep your word, you do not keep your word with what you insisted on and He pleads his own clumsiness and his own cowardice to try to save I don’t know what“Maduro said, referring to the statements made by the 75-year-old former diplomat, who said he had been “coerced” by Venezuelan authorities into exile.

“I feel sorry for him pataruco (a rooster that is not good for fighting), in the end it turned out to be a lopsided rooster (…). No one can claim his own clumsiness in self-defense. González Urrutia, no one can claim his own cowardice and his own betrayal his followers in self-defense,” Maduro said.

The president’s reaction is in response to a message from González Urrutia following the publication of a letter signed by him and the president of Parliament, the powerful Chavista leader Jorge Rodríguez, in which an agreement was set out for his departure from Venezuela.

“While I was (sitting in the residence of the Spanish ambassador), the president of the National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, and the vice president of the Republic, Delcy Rodríguez, showed up with a document that I would have to sign to allow me to leave the country,” González said. “In other words, I either signed it or I would face the consequences.”

According to the Chavista Rodríguez, this document established that González abides by the ruling of the electoral chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (which recognizes the victory of Nicolás Maduro).

González Urrutia, who has been a refugee in Spain since September 8, denounces fraud and claims victory in the elections.

In a video that has been circulating for a few hours, González Urrutia can be seen, in the early morning and wearing a hat, climbing the steps of the Spanish Air Force Falcon that took him to Madrid. He was accompanied to the steps by the Spanish ambassador in Caracas.

Days earlier, his lawyer, José Vicente Haro, had stated that he had no intention of leaving Venezuela. “In no way has Mr. Edmundo González Urrutia requested asylum from any embassy accredited in Venezuela. He has not requested asylum or a status as a guest. This is an issue that has not been raised by the family or Mr. Edmundo,” said Haro.

In an interview that he gave from hiding and that the newspaper The Country Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado said on Thursday: “The regime wanted him to leave. They forced him. He didn’t want to leave.”

Meanwhile, the European Parliament recognized him on Thursday as the “legitimate president” of Venezuela, amid questions about Maduro’s re-election on July 28, in a resolution that the Venezuelan Parliament described as a “disastrous aggression.”

The United States and several Latin American governments also recognized González Urrutia as the winner.