Ep. 8 | Fighting Back from Across the Pond (with Vanessa Neumann, Ph.D.)

In this episode, we discuss the response of the international community to the Maduro dictatorship with Vanessa Neumann, Ph.D., Ambassador and Chief of Mission for the Interim Government of Venezuela to the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Ambassador Neumann was a central figure in a recent historic decision from the London High Court that “unequivocally” recognized the presidential legitimacy of Juan Guaidó over Nicolás Maduro. That decision also barred Maduro from accessing several dozen tons of gold bullion in the Bank of England worth billions of dollars, cutting off a major financial lifeline and escape route for the dictatorship.

Today, Juan Guaidó is recognized by the United Kingdom and roughly sixty other countries around the world as the rightful president of Venezuela. This international coalition of democracies has been instrumental in applying pressure to isolate the Maduro dictatorship by targeting the lingering fragments of its existence outside of Venezuela that allows the regime to count on exit strategies to survive.

In this episode, Ambassador Neumann and I discuss the United Kingdom’s support for the Venezuelan people, details of the case of the Venezuelan gold in the Bank of England, and the recognition of the international community of Juan Guaidó, not Nicolas Maduro, as the constitutionally recognized interim president of Venezuela.

Dr. Neumann is the founder of Asymmetrica, a political risk firm with a specialty in Latin American politics and security. She is the author of "Blood Profits," and a co-author of "The Many Criminal Heads of the Golden Hydra." She was also the academic reviewer for the United States Special Operations Command’s manual on the Assessing Revolutionary and Insurgent Strategies teaching manual on counterinsurgency in Colombia.

Dr. Neumann holds a Ph. D. in political philosophy from Columbia University, and fellowships at Yale University, Columbia University, and the Foreign Policy Research Institute.

In March 2019, Dr. Neumann was appointed Ambassador and Chief of Mission for Venezuela to the Court of St. James’s in the United Kingdom.

Twitter: @vanessaneumann

YouTube: Vanessa Neumann

Embassy of Venezuela in the United Kingdom and Ireland: @EmbajadaVE_UKI

UK and partners joint statement: Free and fair presidential elections in Venezuela