Buenos Aires Herald 
Venezuela broke diplomatic ties with Paraguay and recalled all of its diplomats on Monday. The decision came after Paraguayan President Santiago Peña said opposition member Edmundo González Urrutia was the true winner of the Venezuelan presidential elections.
“It is deplorable that governments like the Paraguayan keep subordinating their foreign policies to the interests of foreign power,” said a communiqué from Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto. It added that they are “promoting agendas destined to undermine democratic principles and the will of free people.”
Caracas’ decision came after Peña shared a Zoom call with González and opposition leader María Corina Machado, who was banned from running in the 2024 elections. González ran in her place, and claims to have won even though President Nicolás Maduro proclaimed himself the winner.
Maduro is set to begin his third term on Friday, despite accusations of fraud and human rights violations.
The statement put out by the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry said that, by backing González, Peña “ignored international law and the principle of non-intervention”.
“No buffoonery instructed by international fascism will bend the will of people who are firm on building their own destiny,” the text finished.
In response, Paraguay decided to order Venezuelan Ambassador to Paraguay Ricardo Capella and all of his diplomatic staff to leave the country within 48 hours. Peña’s government also formally backed González as Venezuela’s president elect in a short statement published on social media.
The call between Peña, González and Machado took place on Sunday. In an X post that day, Peña described González as the “winner of Venezuela’s presidential election,” saying that international reports “confirmed his ample win.”
“We highlighted the need for the region to unite to work towards the utmost respect for popular will and to stop authoritarian regimes from staying in power,” Peña continued. He added that he wanted to contribute to the “restoration of democracy in Venezuela.”
Venezuela’s ongoing feud with Argentina
Venezuela has kicked out the diplomatic personnel of several countries that have backed González as the winner of the July 28 election, including Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Peru, Panama, and Uruguay.
The feud between Caracas and Buenos Aires has been particularly vicious. After the Argentine diplomats left Venezuela, Brazil took over the Argentine embassy in Caracas and began representing Argentina’s interests in Venezuela. This meant that the Brazilian Foreign Ministry became responsible for the six Venezuelan opposition aides who took political asylum in the embassy in March. One of them turned himself in to Venezuelan authorities in late December, but the rest of them are still living in the embassy under what they called an intermittent state of “siege.”
After the election, Venezuela also recalled all of its diplomats in Argentina, causing major disruption for many of the 220,000 Venezuelans immigrants living in Argentina.
The most recent episode of the bickering came on Saturday when Argentine President Javier Milei met with González in Casa Rosada and referred to him as the Venezuelan “president elect.”
In addition to the fierce dispute over the legitimacy of the presidential election, the Maduro administration also arrested an Argentine gendarme in early December after accusing him of espionage.