Geneva - The United States walked out of
the Conference on Disarmament on Tuesday to protest Venezuela
assuming the rotating presidency of the UN-sponsored forum -
as it did a year ago when Syria took the chair.
"We have to try to do what we can to prevent these types of
states from presiding over international bodies," Robert Wood,
US disarmament ambassador, told reporters after leaving the
session in Geneva.
"A representative of Juan Guaido, the interim president,
should be in this body, should be sitting in that chair right
now...The former (Nicolas) Maduro regime is in essence dead, it
just doesn't want to lay down."
Maduro maintains control over Venezuela's state
institutions, calls Guaido a puppet of Washington and blames
US sanctions for a hyperinflationary economic meltdown and
humanitarian crisis.
