A UK court of appeal dealt a fresh blow to Venezuela's political opposition over access to more than $2bn in gold stored in the Bank of England.
Today's ruling challenges a July 2020 lower court decision that favored a Venezuelan interim administration, led by western-backed opposition leader Juan Guaido, over President Nicolas Maduro's government in Caracas.
The new ruling describes Maduro's government as Venezuela's de facto authority, even if the UK recognizes the Guaido administration as the de jure Venezuelan government at the same time. The court effectively bumped the case back to the lower court pending clarification from the Foreign Office.
The ruling is the latest setback for Guaido, who is at risk of losing his constitutional grounding in Venezuela's 6 December National Assembly elections widely deemed as lacking free and fair conditions. Most of his interim team is based outside the Opec country.
The gold stored in the BoE is among Venezuela's international assets over which the Guaido-led administration is seeking to assert authority. The most valuable is Citgo, the US refiner owned by Venezuela's national oil company PdV. Although Guaido has nominal authority over Citgo since last year, his team is struggling to defend it from seizure by bondholders and arbitration claimants. Several key members of Guaido's team have stepped down in recent months, including Citgo chair Luisa Palacios last week.
The UK is among dozens of countries that recognize Guaido as Venezuela's legitimate president, even though Maduro remains in control of nearly all institutions inside the country. Except for the US, the governments that recognize Guaido have not expelled Maduro's ambassadors and maintain diplomatic ties with Caracas.
The Venezuelan central bank (BCV) of the Maduro government, which is the target of extensive US oil and financial sanctions, has been demanding access to some of the gold to pay for Covid-19 pandemic aid through the UN Development Program.
The UK lower court ruling was "completely unrealistic" because the BCV is in "full control of the BCV's offices, mint and day-to-day operations of the central bank in Caracas," said the Maduro government's attorney Sarosh Zaiwalla. "Access to almost €2 billion in gold was being handed over to a group of individuals living outside Venezuela, who the constitutional court in Venezuela had already ruled to have no lawful authority."
Guaido's UK envoy Vanessa Neumann described the next phase in the legal battle over the Venezuelan gold as "technical" and expressed confidence that London would ratify its recognition of Guaido's administration.
"Maduro did not manage to overturn the decision or his recognition," Neumann said. "Now this goes back to the same court where he lost."
