US says Venezuela’s Maduro still illegitimate even after opposition ‘govt’ disbanded

AFP :
The United States said Tuesday it still did not consider Nicolas Maduro to be the legitimate president of Venezuela and would maintain sanctions after the fledgling opposition dissolved its “interim government.”
President Joe Biden’s administration said that Venezuelan government assets in the United States, notably of the state oil company, would remain legally under the authority of the opposition-led National Assembly, which was elected in 2015 but has been disempowered by Maduro’s leftist government.
“Our approach to Nicolas Maduro is not changing. He is not the legitimate leader of Venezuela,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters.
“We continue to recognize what is the only remaining democratically elected institution in Venezuela today, and that’s the 2015 National Assembly,” Price said.
Price said that existing sanctions “remain in place” and that the United States was in touch with the National Assembly on whether a new individual, group or committee would oversee government assets.
The United States, under former president Donald Trump, set a goal of toppling Maduro in 2019 following elections widely seen as fraudulent and as an economic crisis wreaked havoc with shortages of basic necessities.
More than seven million Venezuelans have fled their country, most to neighboring countries but with a growing number making the dangerous trek to the United States.
Joined by most Western and Latin American nations at the time, the United States four years ago recognized the National Assembly’s Juan Guaido as interim president.
The Trump administration put Guaido as a government in control of Citgo, the US refiner that is part of state-owned oil company PDVSA.
Maduro has remained in power with backing from some segments of the population as well as the military, Russia, China and Cuba. The National Assembly — now largely a symbolic force in Caracas — on Friday voted to dissolved Guaido’s “interim government.”