Canada has been trying to destabilize Venezuela at least since 2004

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Paul Jay, editor in chief at The Real News, gave some very interesting information - some based on personal experience - about Canada's total alignment with the US on its imperialist missions against Venezuela and other countries:

Mexico was part of the Lima Group, but now with the new leadership - with AMLO now taking office in Mexico - Mexico is not going along with this plan to recognize Juan Guaido. And Mexico is not the only country of the region. Many, many countries of CARICOM have come forward and have said they do not support this plan. So, the corporate media is trying to make this sound like the whole region is on board with this scheme.

For months, Canada has been playing a leading role in preparing for - according to the Canadian newspapers - for exactly what happened, the recognition of Juan Guaido.

And Canada has been into this scheme for months. And the rationale is supposedly that the election of 2017 was not a legitimate election because people were supposedly kept out. The press is not telling people that there was a big boycott from the opposition that didn’t want to run because there are supposed to have been various infractions in the 2017 elections that reelected Maduro. This is the rationale for why Canada gets so involved. Well, it’s a total crock. And the reason it’s a crock is - I know from personal experience - that Canada has been trying to destabilize [Venezuela] and nurture and promote the opposition in Venezuela at least from 2004.

When Chavez was still in power, Chavez had been elected over and over again with internationally observed elections. Everyone said the elections were clean during the Chavez period. Many people that tried to throw the elections into disrepute were invalidated. The Carter Center legitimatized them.

I actually personally was on an election observer mission to go to polling stations in 2004, 2005 - one of the elections leading up to the referendum on Chavez’s presidency. And I went to 40 polling stations, and I interviewed opposition people in all 40 polling stations in Caracas. And I asked, ‘have you seen any infractions, and if there were any infractions were they dealt with properly?’ And I took video, and I recorded it all, and there wasn’t a single complaint from an opposition observer that there had been anything done incorrectly with those elections. This vote led to a referendum on Chavez’s presidency. And in fact, the opposition won that vote.

Right around that time, when they were clean elections and Chavez was getting elected over and over again, my first trip to Venezuela in 2004, I was producing the big debate show on Canadian TV called Counterspin on CBC Newsworld. I was a well-known documentary filmmaker. I had founded the Big Hot Docs! Documentary Film Festival. So I was a known quantity in Canada.

And so, when I was in Venezuela I said for the heck of it I’ll go say hello to the Canadian Embassy, and take their temperature. The number two charge d’affaires greets me and brings me into a meeting room with seven members of the opposition who then for – it must have been two hours – beat me over the head with how corrupt the regime was, how awful it was, and so on.

I’m not going to comment on what was right or wrong with what the opposition people said. I have perhaps that sort of experience. I don’t know. What I do know is what business does the Canadian Embassy have bring in a Canadian journalist into a room with opposition people, essentially trying to involve me in a conspiracy against the Venezuelan government.

So this Canadian role in Venezuela it’s been going on for a long time, and has been very, very active in trying to destabilize the situation, promote and nurture the opposition.

And clearly for two reasons.

Number one, Canada is one of the biggest mining nations in the world and Venezuela has tremendous untapped natural resources, particularly gold. Canada has a very strong gold mining sector. And Canadian companies weren’t easily getting at that gold. There was one company called Crystallex that actually had a concession and then lost it. So, the ability to nurture an opposition and get an in with an opposition that might come to power, and then favour Canadian mining companies, I think that’s one motivation.

And another motivation, I think, has to do with Canada’s role historically; how it plays with the United States and helps the U.S. and its foreign policy. And I once interviewed a Canadian general in 2004, Lewis MacKenzie. And I asked him, ‘why is Canada so into this Afghan war? You know, this Afghan, post-9/11. It could have been dealt with as a police-type operation, in terms of going after al Qaeda. But a full-fledged invasion, full-fledged regime change? Why is Canada in this, and in it for the long haul? Because it’s 2004, after the invasion of Iraq.’ And his answer was, I think, very instructive. He said, ‘well, we didn’t go to Iraq. So to keep our ability to selling goods into the United States, we needed to pay with some blood. We needed to send troops to Afghanistan and have some Canadian soldiers killed to show we’re willing to share the burden.’ He didn’t use the word empire, but that’s essentially what he was saying.

So, this role of Canada assisting in very nefarious American policy, and giving it this Canadian, ‘oh, we’re for the UN, we’re humanitarians’ - giving it that veneer, it’s an important role that Canada plays. But I think, now the recognition of Guaido so exposes Canada because it’s such a clear violation of the UN charter of non-interference in internal affairs.

Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, it was his father that played exactly this role in Vietnam. There was something called the International Control Commission, the ICC, that was, I believe, under the auspices of the UN, supposed to monitor treaties and such and during the Vietnam War. And they would go to Hanoi and interview people in the North, and they would observe, and then they would come back. And it turned out that the Canadian delegation, completely contrary to international law and the norms of such a commission, was going back and reporting to the CIA on what was going on in North Vietnam, and straightforwardly spying. So, it seems to be a family business in the Trudeau family to play this kind of a role.