Former Venezuelan opposition presidential candidate Edmundo González has fled the country to seek asylum in Spain, according to the Venezuelan government, Euro News reported.
Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez announced that the government decided to grant González safe passage out of the country, just days after ordering his arrest, to help restore “the country’s political peace and tranquility.”
González, who several foreign governments consider to be the legitimate winner of July's presidential race, was granted asylum in Spain.
González and opposition leader Maria Corina Machado have not yet commented.
Meanwhile, Spain’s centre-left government said the decision to abandon Venezuela was González's alone and he departed on a plane sent by the country's air force.
“Spain is committed to the political rights and physical integrity of all Venezuelans,” Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said on the X social media platform.
González, a former diplomat, was a last minute stand in when Machado was banned from running.
Previously unknown to most Venezuelans, his campaign nonetheless rapidly ignited the hopes of millions of Venezuelans desperate for change after a decade long economic freefall.
Most Western governments have contested the results of July's election, which declared President Nicolás Maduro the winner. Opposition volunteers who have collected tally sheets from electronic voting machines indicate that González won the election.
The Maduro controlled panel of the National Electoral Council did not release the result of over 30,000 voting machines after this year's elections, blaming an alleged cyberattack from North Macedonia.
Attorney General Tarek William Saab, a staunch Maduro ally, has sought González's arrest after he failed to appear three times in connection to a criminal investigation into what it considers an act of electoral sabotage.
Saab told reporters the voting records the opposition shared online were forged and an attempt to undermine the National Electoral Council.
Experts from the United Nations and the Carter Centre, which at the invitation of Maduro’s government observed the election, determined the results announced by electoral authorities lacked credibility.
In a statement critical of the election, the UN experts stopped short of validating the opposition’s claim to victory, but they said the voting records it published online appear to exhibit all of the original security features.
MNA/PR
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