Caught in the middle of Venezuela’s power struggle, a worried China weighs its options

Chinese diplomats in Caracas are working day and night to help Beijing determine how best to deal with Juan Guaido, the self-declared leader of Venezuela who may not favour continuing the oil-for-loans deals that have underpinned China’s relations with the South American country for years.

China’s envoys in the Venezuelan capital frequently hold late-night conference calls with officials back in Beijing as they try to set a strategy for getting along with Guaido, who declared himself Venezuela’s acting president in January after incumbent President Nicolas Maduro won an election marked by low turnout and allegations of irregularities.

“At the top of everyone’s mind [at the Chinese embassy and in Beijing] was the degree to which goodwill should be shown to and accepted from Guaido,” a person who had been briefed about one such conference call – and was not authorised to talk to the media – told the South China Morning Post on condition of anonymity.

Although the US and dozens of other Western and Latin American countries had endorsed Guaido as president – adding a power struggle to the woes of hyperinflation and US sanctions on its state oil company that have hit the country – Beijing had made it clear that switching support publicly from the embattled Maduro to Guaido would be out of the question.

But with the future of China’s oil projects in Venezuela and nearly US$20 billion that Caracas owes Beijing suddenly uncertain, China’s diplomats remained eager to find out more about the 35-year-old opposition leader. That task marked a change of pace for Beijing.