president nicolas maduro voted out after more than a decade of his authoritarian socialist rule. at least, that's according to the polls, which put the opposition parties 20 points ahead. my guest today, maria corina machado, should have been their candidate. but as institutions loyal to the government have blocked her from standing, she backed the relatively unknown retired diplomat edmundo gonzalez to stand in her place. with the country's economy in ruins and more than a quarter of the population having fled, could the next few days change the fortunes of this oil—rich but very troubled nation?

maria corina machado, welcome to hardtalk. thank you very much. can your coalition win this election? absolutely, yes. we have never before had so much strength, support all over the country and organisation to defend every single vote next sunday. so if your coalition does win it, what role will you have in the new government? well, that is for the next president to say. but it is important that everybody knows that we are a team, we're working together, we trust each other, and i will be serving my country all the way in this transition process

until we can build up strong democratic institutions in venezuela. edmundo gonzalez, the candidate, has said, "she will have whatever role she desires in the government." so what is the role you want? i think it is too early to say. we are living day by day. first of all, we're concentrated in this huge, unique, epic event that will change not only the history of venezuela but the whole region. it is important to understand that there's no single other conflict in the western hemisphere more important than what is taking place in venezuela, and certainly we're facing a tyranny which has produced, as you say, the exodus of over a quarter of our population, that has violated all human rights, committed crimes against humanity, but at the same time has ties with russia, with iran, and that's trying to destabilise the region. so this is an event,

as i say, that impacts beyond ourfrontiers or our borders and should have the attention and support of all democrats around the world. 0k. but to come back to what people are actually voting for, are they voting for edmundo gonzalez — someone who isn't widely known — or are they voting for you? they are voting for a cause, for the values we represent. certainly i had a huge responsibility, and i received a mandate when we won the primaries with over 90% of the votes last october. but the country has to understand clearly that these obstacles the regime has put, we have to find ways to overcome them. and that's how edmundo gonzalez appeared and he has been, you know, an incredible candidate, even though he had no previous experience. and people trust when i ask them to support him.

and we're being very clear, very transparent in terms that he will be the president and certainly he will have the legitimacy of this huge, massive vote with a huge, historic turnout that we will have next sunday. 0k. but ijust want to be clear. i mean, did you choose him, as you say, because he has no political history, did you choose him because you will act as president in a new government? is that the plan? absolutely not. that would be an insult to him and to the venezuelan people. but he will do what you... one imagines — i mean, when you went to him and you asked him to stand and you gave him your support, there was some understanding that he is going to be doing what you want. the understanding is that he will be doing what is correct, what the venezuelan people need. and certainly we share values and ideas. but he will be an independent president, certainly. and he knows he has my support, because we will be leaving perhaps the most complex

and delicate transition in the history of this hemisphere, because as you know, and you were mentioning before, venezuela has no institutions standing today. and there will be huge, great expectations for change and results in a very short term from the people that will vote. so this would require a huge, huge and wide government that will involve every single sector. and that's what we are planning to do. and we should be clear that you have been blocked from standing because you have been accused of fraud, just so that people understand why you're in the situation that you are. something one imagines that if the coalition were elected, that they could just immediately overturn. look, i've been accused of almost every single crime. every single crime. i've been banned from leaving my country for over ten years. i'm not allowed to get

in a plane, even private planes to move around my country. when i move with my car, streets and avenues are blocked. i cannot even rent a room in a hotel to stay over in any city around the country, because they are sanctioned and closed. i cannot even buy food in the road, because the restaurants are penalised. i cannot appear on national tv or radio for over ten years. i mean, this has been a huge campaign against us. my closest members of our team, of our campaign team are either in jail or under protection at the argentinian embassy, because they were — they had warrants to detain them, accused of horrible things, absurd conspirations. because the regime thinks that doing this kind of aggression, they will get people afraid and stop participating.

but this has been huge. i mean, we are faced with a true social movement that goes beyond an electoral struggle. and there is a human rights ngo, foro penal, which has kept a tally of what it calls political prisoners, saying more than 100 people linked to your campaign have been detained. you say that while you were out campaigning last week, your car was vandalised, the oil was drained, the brake hose was cut. i just wonder, given all that, why you are so confident that the elections will be free and fair. because fear and lies are not working any more. the chavismo has totally lost their social support. i mean, the base of support has eroded, has simply crumbled. and what we are seeing is a society coming back together, because we all share one desire. we want to have our kids back home, and this is something

that every single person around the country tells me. even people that come from the chavismo, even the military that stopped me at the checkpoints, the poorest and the people that are well—doing, we all want to have our country and our family back together, and chavismo is being seen not only as a collapse, but as the past. and maduro, the only thing that he has left is violence and it's not working. and even though we have no resources, no media, no support, no vehicles, no transportation, what has happened in these last months, as i say, it's a huge social movement that understands that this is a unique opportunity to save venezuelan families. and so you are seeing people willing to do absolutely extraordinary things — walk five, six, seven hours under the rain or sunjust to meet me in huge rallies, to embrace each other. and this is very powerful

and has turned, and i want to insist this in a unique platform to defend every single vote, done it with volunteers and people that are willing to stay there as they are as long as it takes, but to respect the will of the venezuelan people and that will prevail. and so whatever the result is, will you respect it? the result should be respected by maduro and should be accompanied by the international community. as you mentioned, every single serious poll states that edmundo has over 30, even a0 points in the gap. and this is growing. there's no way they can under... you know, reduce that unless they commit huge fraud, huge fraud, obscene fraud. and we are fighting to prove that and to show it.

and that's why it's so important to have international observers, most of which the regime has blocked from coming. but i'm not clear. if you don't win, will you accept that? we will accept the truth. we will defend the truth. and we have to insist that we have every single organisation or institution in the country right now allied or controlled by the regime, talking about the military, the police and the electoral system. so this is a huge fight of the venezuelan citizens, society defending its right against the whole system. but believe me, the system is cracking for the first time in 25 years. and that's why it's so important that we have international media, a few international observers, and certainly people that are guests, that are coming because they understand how

important it is that the world understands, understands what truly happens in venezuela next sunday. but the national electoral council set up an agreement which maduro and seven other countries signed, candidates signed, but edmundo gonzalez did not sign it. this was about accepting the result. why did he not? why did your party not? first of all, what we've seen in the past is the... ..electoral council does not comply with its own rules and just comes up with a result that is not a reflection of what truly happens. and we will not come to the point to say unless we have the tally sheets, unless they respect the right to have our observers in every single poll, unless they do not block the right for a response to vote, we will not accept what they say, which is clearly a violation of the process.

we will respect the truth. and i have to say that all those candidates that you mentioned are not opposition candidates. those are candidates that are part of a phoney system maduro has created. ok, so from the sounds of it, you will only accept... the only outcome you will accept is a win for your party. we know that president maduro had... he was reported by cnn to be saying, if they do not want venezuela to fall into a bloodbath, into a fratricidal civil war, the ruling party must win the presidential elections. it makes one wonder what happens. let me be very clear. first of all, we will accept and defend the truth of what happens next sunday. that's what we will do. defend the vote of every single venezuelans. and we will do that based on a process which allows us

to have citizens in every single polling station with access to the tally sheets, which we will report, first of all. secondly, maduro has been threatening for years — and i would say chavez did, as well — that we face a dilemma. either they would stay or it would be violence. submission or violence. and that's not true. our choice is freedom. and what they are saying, threatened with violence, is a message directed mostly to the international community to accept a fraudulent result. unless they would... because they would provoke, um, war or violence. look, to have a war, you need an enemy. and we have no enemies in venezuela. our country has come together. we want peace — peace and freedom. and that's what we will

achieve next sunday. so the vote is on sunday, the inauguration is not until january. that's a six—month handover. what is... what is the role of the military in this? how do you think they should be behaving? you've called on them to guarantee a legitimate and orderly transition, but they have historically seen to be... president maduro says they are loyal to him. that's a very important question, and nobody can answer it completely. i do believe, and that's what i'm watching in my constant, um, contact around the country when i travel, by car, that the base of the military, as it has happened in the rest of the country, are longing for change. they have mothers, sisters, children that are also in hunger or fleeing the country. and we're starting to see more and more people, not only from the military and the police and even

the ruling party reaching out to us, asking how this transition process will involve them. and we're giving guarantees that this will be an open process in which everybody that complies with our constitution and the law can be part of it, and giving them assurances that we will not reproduce persecution or revenge as this system has done in the past. we will open arms and hearts for a new venezuela that will arise, in which we will all be equal in front of the law. and i believe that we will see the military and i trust they will simply comply and respect what the constitutions — our constitution — expect from them — to be vigilant and to respect the will of the people that

overwhelmingly and massively will vote next sunday for edmundo gonzalez and a peaceful transition to democracy in venezuela. you talk about that — benjamin gedan, who's a former south america director on national security at the white house and runs the wilson center's latin american programme, said it's wishful thinking to imagine the election will produce overnight democratisation. he seemed to suggest that the best—case scenario was a very complex, uncertain but still promising political transition that could even take years. do you accept that? certainly. i'm the first one who insists in the complexity of the challenges we face and, uh, how profound the destruction of our institutions and economy has gone, uh, has happened with these two decades of chavismo. but i also heard that kind of scepticism last year when we were facing the primary

and said that there would be no way the venezuelan people would arise again and get together in a single candidate, or even be days away from an election that we will win. so venezuelans have done miracles in the past, and believe me, the energy to recover our country and to bring ourfamily back will be huge and we will see people working hard in order to turn this huge potential our country has into a welfare for and wellbeing for every single family. let's talk about what you would like to do in power in a moment. um, but first, will president maduro be offered an amnesty? because he's facing charges by the usjustice department that date from 2020, where he was indicted on, er, narco—terrorism, cocaine dealing campaign against the us.

should he be offered an amnesty if you win? we have repeatedly offered maduro to engage in a serious negotiation with us that would be...give guarantees and incentives for a peaceful transition. the content and specific issues that will be part of this negotiation, we will be deal...dealt in a private manner, as you can understand. so, what, you have had negotiations? well, there have been negotiations certainly that, er, brought to the signing of the barbados agreement last october. the problem was that this part of the agreement, we comply with every single element that we signed and we're committed to. but the regime violated, once again. i'm talking specifically about an amnesty, because there have also been talks involving the us in qatar. is it your understanding that there have been talks

about a possible amnesty for president maduro? we will certainly not get into specifics at this point. 0k. but you're not ruling it out? we have decided that every negotiation will take place with the right, uh, representatives of each side and done in a serious and convenient manner so that, um, we will move ahead as fast as we can, as orderly and sustainable as it is... ..it is needed. 0k. so let's assume that you take power. are you going to privatise what are the largest oil reserves in the world in venezuela? i certainly believe that we have to open to private markets. there's no way the state can take advantage of that. we have no resources. they were all robbed. and, uh, and we have the potential to turn venezuela into the energy hub of the americas.

today, venezuela is in the last place, worldly — globally — in terms of rule of law. no—one will invest the amount venezuela requires to make use not only of our oil and gas, but also in a renewable capacity in energy. no—one is... you will open up the oil markets and privatise them? absolutely. we will open it. gradually move along that... ..that direction. and not only oil and gas. we will do that in mining, in infrastructure, in communication. i mean, we have to open markets and bring huge investments that will turn into employment and wellbeing for the venezuelan people. certainly. you come from a very wealthy family. you were educated abroad. you spent time in your family's mountain retreat when you were young. you said yourself it was a childhood protected from reality. as people listen to you here talking about privatising the natural wealth of venezuela, how confident can they be that you will look

after them, that you will act for them? listen to me. we have had 25 years of chavismo socialism. if there is one society that wants open market and freedom, that doesn't want to have the results of state controlling your life, is the venezuelan people. and it's... for me, it's amazing to see that even more... the more the people are from popular sectors or farmers are the most that value private property. and when you ask public employees in the old sector or others for whom you would want to work, they unanimously answer they want to work for a private company, for a private sector, because they see the difference not only in wages but in social protection. so i believe this is a unique

moment in which we want a wealthy society. yes, that's what we want. we want the state, uh, under society and not the other way around. and, um, the price to learn this has been high, very high in suffering for the venezuelan people. well, you talk about... sorry. you talk about the number of people who have fled the country to go overseas. you have three children outside the country who you haven't been able to see for some time, because you're not allowed to leave the country. if you do win, is one of the first things you'll do is to reunite with them? i have one...and two boys, and certainly the first thing i will do is call them and tell them it's time to come home. do you think that will be going on in a lot of families? oh, yes. not only that, there are a lot of people — it's perhaps what i hear

the most nowadays — young people coming up to me and telling me, "i don't want to go. i don't want to leave." women that tell me, "this is my last child here." and, you know, grabbing them. grandparents telling me have only known my grandchildren through a whatsapp, you know, screen, and this could be the last chance they have to meet them before they die. so that's why this has turned for venezuelans much more than an electoral issue. this has turned into a real spiritual struggle, and that has brought the country together. so this is very powerful. this goes beyond the election. it's a... it's a movement for redemption and for freedom. and perhaps you have to be venezuelan to understand it. but believe me, that's why i'm so confident that a result will be a better country in which we will all be together.

maria corina machado, thank you for coming on hardtalk. thank you very much. hello. there is nothing too drastic or dramatic coming up weather—wise over the next few days. that said, it will be a somewhat mixed affair. some sunshine through the day on wednesday, equally a little bit of showery rain. what we've got is this big area of high pressure, the azores high, just trying to extend its influence towards the uk. however, we also have this frontal system pushing in from the west. so what that means is a lot

of dry weather to start the day on wednesday, with some spells of sunshine, but with that weak frontal system pushing in, we'll see increasing amounts of cloud and some outbreaks of showery rain for northern ireland, parts of western scotland, wales, the southwest of england and even further east, where we hold on to some sunny spells — we will see one or two sharp showers breaking out, but it will feel pretty warm in eastern and particularly south eastern parts, 25 or 26 degrees. not quite as warm further west with the extra cloud, the showery rain. and as we head through wednesday night, we'll see increasingly cloudy conditions. it will be quite murky and a little bit damp and drizzly in places as we import some more humid air. so temperatures on thursday morning generally starting the day between 13 and 16 degrees. pretty muggy start to the day, and a really complex weather chart with several different frontal systems in play across the uk. what that will mean is a lot of cloud, some outbreaks of rain, one clump of potentially heavy rain pushing across southern counties of england

and the channel islands. elsewhere, we'll see some bits and pieces of showery rain across parts of northern ireland, western scotland, in between one or two glimmers of sunshine and temperatures between 16 and 22 degrees. now, as we head into friday, actually, it's not a bad—looking day, we'll see some spells of sunshine. the chance for one or two showers, particularly across scotland and northern ireland — not as many showers for england and wales — and in the sunshine, it is going to feel warm. the sun is strong at this time of year, temperatures easily getting up into the 20s. a little bit cooler further north and west with more cloud and with those showers. and then as we head towards the weekend, it's a familiar story, really, this area of high pressure, the azores high, still trying to exert its influence, but not strong enough to fend off all the frontal systems. so there will be some showery rain at times, particularly towards the north and the west of the uk, drier and turning warmer further south and east.

live from london. this is bbc news. kamala harris says the november us presidential election is a choice between freedom and chaos, at herfirst rally since becoming the presumptive democratic nominee for the white house. israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu prepares to address us congress as hundreds of activists protest against his visit.

here in the uk, seven mps are suspended from the labour party, after rebelling against the government on an amendment to scrap the two—child benefit cap. in taiwan, flights are cancelled and financial markets closed as the country prepares for the arrival of typhoon gaemi. we start in the us — where kamala harris has said the presidential election in november is a choice between freedom and chaos. she was addressing her first campaign rally since gathering enough party support to become the democratic nominee for president. speaking in wisconsin — which will be a crucial state to win if she wants to enter the white house — she accused her rival, donald trump, of wanting to take the country backward, and vowed to unite her party —

in order to win the election.