Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Photo: Google

By THE PULSE NEWS MEXICO STAFF

The government of Venezuela’s autocratic president, Nicolás Maduro, announced Saturday, Oct. 16, that is is suspending its participation in mediation talks with opposition leaders, that were due to restart on Sunday, Oct. 17.

Maduro, a close friend and political ally of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), who had initiated the talks in September, said that it was halting the mediation with its political opponents in retaliation for the extradition from Cape Verde to the United States of a close Maduro ally, Colombian businessman Alex Saab, who U.S. prosecutors consider a key witness in Venezuelan corruption.