Lula to Mediate Venezuela Crisis – Major News Orgs Hide Attack from Public – AFL-CIO Denounces Raid – Payday Report

Folks, 
Greetings from the Burgh, where I have been watching the news about Venezuela since being woken up at 4 am to text messages about the bombings. I’ve been on the phone with activists in Brasil, DC, and here in Pittsburgh. 
Lula Offers to Mediate Venezuela Crisis 
Earlier today, Trump announced that the United States had kidnapped Venezuelan President Maduro. Trump pledged to work with the remaining members of Maduro’s administration to set up a transition government until elections could be held. Trump even said that the United States would “run Venezuela for a while.” 
How the transition will occur in Venezuela is incredibly unclear. With the threat of more military action, Trump has leverage over Venezuela, but the Venezuelan military is massive and civilians are mobilized, and so it seems unlikely that Trump could mount a full-scale invasion. 
Over the following weeks and months, other leaders in Latin America are likely to have crucial roles in mediating between the United States and Venezuela. 
Recently, Trump has made extensive efforts to develop relations with Brazilian President Lula, who Trump has praised publicly at legnth. Lula has extensive experience mediating agreements between various countries including the United States and Iran. On Saturday, while denouncing the raid, Lula offered to serve as a mediator between the United States and Venezuela. 
“The action recalls the worst moments of interference in Latin America and the Caribbean politics and threatens the preservation of the region as a zone of peace,” said Lula in a statement. “The international community, through the United Nations, needs to respond vigorously to this episode. Brasil condemns these actions and follows the willingness to promote the path of dialogue and cooperation.”. 
Melk in Brasil in 3 Weeks 
Last year, I received a small grant to do some work on a documentary about the assassination of my college classmate Marielle Franco, a Rio city councilwoman, that I have been working on for some years. I will be down in Brazil for a little more than a month and hope to cover what Brazilians are saying about the situation in their neighboring country, Venezuela. 
However, my grant for documentary work is relatively small. (I’m staying with my old host family from 20 years ago to save money). I am going to need to raise a bit of budget to cover how Brazilians are pushing back against the attack on Latin America. 
AFL-CIO Denounces Attack on Venezuela. 
Earlier today on Facebook, the AFL-CIO denounced the attack on Venezuela and endorsed a statement by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 
“The ITUC  and CSA – Confederación Sindical de Trabajadores/as de las Américas strongly condemn the US military aggression against Venezuela and the violation of its sovereignty,” said the ITUC in a statement. “We call for respect for the Venezuelan people’s right to self-determination, the immediate release of all those detained, and a return to peaceful and democratic dialogue”. 
Major Outlets Kept Pending US Attack on Venezuela Secret
Max Tani and Shelby Talcott have a major expose at Semafor looking at why several major news organizations cooperated with the demands of the Trump Administration and refused to go public with the news. From Semafor: 
For more, check out Semafor. 
Alright folks, that’s all for today. We will have more updates as the week goes on. Keep sending tips, story ideas, comments, and complaints to melk@paydayreport.com 
For our news update subscribe to our newsletter. You can unsubscribe anytime.

source
This is a newsfeed from leading technology publications. No additional editorial review has been performed before posting.