THE recent defence of the Maduro administration published in these pages was not merely a different “perspective” (“Venezuela: of mice, minions and Revolution,” Thinking Allowed, January 17).

As members of Perth’s Venezuelan community have made clear, it was a radical-left propaganda campaign. 

While activists outside the US Consulate speak of “social reforms,” those who lived under the regime describe a far darker reality – one defined by massacres, kidnappings, state violence, and a country effectively held hostage for over 27 years.

A Protest Without the People on Monday, 5 January, reportedly 100 protesters – including Greens MPs and socialist organisers – gathered outside the US Consulate in Perth. 

Yet, as the Herald reported, the Venezuelan community itself was conspicuously absent from this so-called “solidarity” movement.

 As one local expat, Vic, observed: there was 100 percent certainty that not a single Venezuelan attended in support of Maduro.

For many in Perth’s Venezuelan diaspora, this absence speaks volumes. 

What was presented as solidarity, appeared instead as political exploitation: a small group of local activists presuming to speak for an entire nation without the presence or consent of those most affected.

It is the height of irony, that Western activists claim to speak for “the people” while disregarding the 7.9 million Venezuelans who have fled the country, a figure cited by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. 

For many expats, these protests suggest that activists are driven less by concern for human suffering than by geopolitical narratives. 

Attention to Venezuelan resources only seems to intensify when the United States is involved; meanwhile, two decades of repression, rape, and economic collapse elicited little to no outrage against their (Conrade) “comrade” Maduro.

The reality of “kidnapped” resources 

Claims that the United States is “kidnapping” Venezuelan oil do not withstand scrutiny.

As community members and independent analysts have noted, the country’s resources were effectively seized long ago by the Maduro regime and its strategic partners in Russia, China, Iran, and Cuba to fund state-sponsored terrorism. 

While the US was among the few buyers paying in cash, the regime increasingly bartered oil for the security assistance and political backing that helped it remain in power. 

This arrangement amounted not to sovereignty, but to the systematic mortgaging of Venezuela’s future.

A Catalogue of State-Sponsored Horrors 

Behind the romantic language of revolution lies extensive documentation of crimes against humanity. 

According to reports by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights published in 2024 and 2025, the so-called “Bolivarian process” has been sustained through:

• “Operation Tun-Tun” (Knock-Knock): A campaign of terror where security forces raid homes to detain activists and election workers — Venezuelan citizens, not foreign agents;

• Systemic Torture: UN findings detail the use of electric shocks, waterboarding, and sexual violence in detention centres like El Helicoide, aimed at extracting confessions or silencing dissent;

• The “White Vans”: Unmarked vehicles operated by SEBIN, the intelligence service, used to abduct critics from public spaces and foster a pervasive climate of fear; and,

• The Weaponisation of Hunger: UN agencies have documented how government food programmes, like CLAP, are distributed based on political loyalty, while millions of children suffer chronic malnutrition and hospitals lack basic supplies.

The Inevitable Trajectory of Dictatorship 

Why do socialists in democratic countries like Australia so frequently rush to the defence of foreign authoritarian regimes? 

According to the diaspora, the answer lies in ideological fixation. Revolutionary imagery and opposition to the West are prioritised over the lived experiences and human rights of ordinary people.

Venezuela’s collapse is not an anomaly. 

It reflects the predictable outcome of systems that concentrate power under the banner of “social justice.” 

Time and again, such systems begin with promises of equality and end with repression, institutional collapse, and citizens forced to flee or face starvation or a dictator.

True solidarity with Venezuela does not mean defending an autocrat entrenched behind security forces funded by a drug cartel. 

It means listening to the Venezuelan voices in Perth who are finally hopeful for a return to a rights-respecting democracy after decades of state-sponsored misery.