Sanctions against Nicaragua and Venezuela as well as the illegal and inhumane blockade of Cuba must stop immediately, said Adrian Weir, union director for Unite, at the opening ceremony at the House of Friendship, in central London.

Academic Kate Hudson, secretary general of the Nuclear Disarmament Campaign, denounced that Washington’s efforts to halt and overthrow progressive government projects in Latin America have never stopped, and recalled the 2009 coup in Honduras and similar events in Bolivia 10 years later.

He pointed out that this hostile policy has intensified in recent months with the imposition of new sanctions on Nicaragua, the refusal to recognize the election results in Venezuela and efforts to weaken the socialist regime in Cuba.

Labor lawmaker John McDonnell, for his part, criticized Britain’s Conservative government for refusing to condemn Jair Bolsonaro’s regime in Brazil and remaining silent about the killing of union leaders and left-wing militants in Colombia.

It is time for us to denounce the role of the British government, said the politician, pointing out that London has never spoken out against the coup against Bolivian President Evo Morales or against the sanctions imposed by Washington on Venezuela.

Weir, Hudson and McDonnell, as well as the Secretary General of the Spanish Communist Party, Enrique Santiago, and former Ecuadorian Foreign Minister Guillaume Long, speaking by videoconference, expressed satisfaction with the recent defeats suffered by the coup regimes in Bolivia and Honduras.

They also share hopes of electoral victories for progressive and left-wing forces in Chile, Colombia and Brazil.

There is no better place to find inspiration for our cause than Latin America, said Hudson.

Nearly a hundred British, European and Latin American experts, academics, trade unionists and politicians participated in the conference on Latin America.

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