US Flights to Venezuela Resume After 7 Years

Latin America Correspondent Jon Bonfiglio speaks to Henry Bonsu for Times Radio. 

Transcript

Henry Bonsu 0:00

After a seven-year suspension, flights between the US and Venezuela resumed this week. Flight AA3599 from Envoy Air arrived in Caracas yesterday afternoon after departing Miami, and it landed ahead of schedule, and the arrival is significant. So arriving in the Venezuelan capital, it would appear to mark a dramatic shift in relations between the USA and Venezuela. They haven't had a direct airlink um since 2019. Well, we can talk to Jon Bonfiglio, Latin America correspondent. Jon, uh I gave it quite a talk up a few minutes ago. I'm wondering um how justified I was in doing so. How um how major is this?

Speaker 1 0:44

Well, it certainly felt that way. There's been huge celebration both in Miami where the where the Envoy Air American Airlines subsidiary took uh took off from. Yesterday, of course. Uh bear in mind that Miami is one of the has one of the largest concentrations of Venezuelans outside of Venezuela itself. And on arrival in uh in Caracas, uh, there was music, there was there was dancing, there was there was statements. Um, and on the flight itself, there was Venezuelan coffee and arepas, the Venezuelan cornmeal pasty, which was served. So, I mean, to all its sense of purposes, it feels as though the last 15 years just didn't take place. Service uh has been resumed.

Henry Bonsu 1:19

And what do we think is going to herald? Because it's one thing for an initial flight and it's very symbolic, but are we going to see many more flights and then further trade?

Speaker 1 1:31

Yes, so we've seen um that one flight. My understanding is that there's gonna be a second flight which begins on the on the 21st of May. I think what it heralds is really a matter of selective perception. Uh, Venezuelans abroad, um, which is approximately a third of Venezuela's population, um, certainly see it as a possibility to reconnect. Venezuelan opposition figures, I think they see this beginning of the fluidity of movement as a potential sign of the beginnings of a transition towards democracy. But I think the key statement was made by US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, who said that today, yesterday, was about more than just a flight. "It's a critical milestone in strengthening the US relationship with Venezuela and unleashing economic opportunity in both countries." And that's a key statement. So we've known all along, Henry, that this is about access to virgin or near-virgin markets and this restoration uh of the flights between the USA and Caracas is another step towards that.

Henry Bonsu 2:26

Yeah, and and um I I occasionally uh meet uh Venezuelans here in uh the UK, John, and some of them have been here for quite some time, and they were really hoping that hoping that when the opposition leader Maria Corina Machado uh got the Nobel Peace Prize and then gave it to Trump, it was going to be the beginning of real change, and that having got rid of uh Maduro, um, there was going to be some support for the opposition. That's melted away. Delcy Rodriguez um is apparently Trump's favourite person, and uh he has no intention of trying to oust her.

Speaker 1 3:02

No, and actually, um Diosdado Cabello, a major, a really important figure in the Venezuelan administration, when asked yesterday before the flight took off about uh potential transition towards um democracy, roundly said uh that this was not the time for elections. This that um it undoubtedly is true that what remains intact despite a variety of changes, the state's repressive machinery, no reforms have been made then, and what we'd seen um over a period of the last few months, about the beginning of a release of political prisoners, has entirely has entirely ceased. And Delcy Rodriguez has now also um cemented her position. She's undertaken something of a purge, sidelining Maduro allies and bringing in her own people across top positions in the government, military, and and judiciary. That that the lady is not to be moved.

Henry Bonsu 3:47

Yeah. And what about those Venezuelans who uh, by their hundreds of thousands, had sought and received temporary temporary protective status in the US, uh, which has been threatened by the return of uh the Trump administration. Um, I presume that uh Donald Trump and um his administration will now say, well, you know, Venezuela's changing, we've got all these diplomatic relations, there are flights happening, you can take one of them and go back.

Speaker 1 4:15

Yeah, I mean, they would have said that, and they have been saying it before things changed anyway. There's there's a huge disconnect between uh US policy towards Venezuela and um how uh the US is dealing with uh Venezuelan migrants in in the United States uh itself. It's it sees them as two entirely uh different things uh uh essentially. But you know, what we have certainly seen change. I mean, that possibly the biggest change is how US sanctions have been lifted and legal reforms made in the oil and mining sectors, which again we sort of we highlighted, and of course that's designed to attract foreign investment. Um again this oil exports in the last week reached a seven-year high in Venezuela, and of course that's to do with uh with uh the sort of the opening of that market, but it also has to do with uh with what's taking place in Iran and the high price of oil and trying to um to leverage that for maximum opportunity.

Henry Bonsu 5:08

All right, Jon, thank you very much indeed for joining us on Times radio. That's Jon Bonfiglio, Latin America Correspondent.