Julián Isaías Rodríguez Díaz (born 16 December 1942) VicePresidency of Venezuela
Julián Isaías Rodríguez Díaz
, accessed 4 June 2012 is a Venezuelan politician,

diplomat A diplomat (from grc, δίπλωμα; romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state or an intergovernmental institution such as the United Nations or the European Union to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or internati ...

and

lawyer A lawyer is a person who practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, solic ...

. He was appointed the vice president of Venezuela on 29 January 2000 by

Hugo Chávez Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (; 28 July 1954 – 5 March 2013) was a Venezuelan politician who was president of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013, except for a brief period in 2002. Chávez was also leader of the Fifth Republ ...

, and served in the post until 26 December 2000.

Career

Rodríguez Díaz earned his law degree and specialized in labor law at the Universidad Central de Venezuela, where he began his political activities with the political party Democratic Action. He left Democratic Action in 1967 together with Luis Beltrán Prieto Figueroa to join the new

Movimiento Electoral del Pueblo The People's Electoral Movement (''Movimiento Electoral del Pueblo'', MEP) is a left-wing political party in Venezuela, founded in 1967 by Luis Beltrán Prieto Figueroa. The MEP was founded after Prieto Figueroa won the 1967 Acción Democrátic ...

, which he participated in until 1981. In 1990 he served as Attorney Aragua. In the elections of November 1998 he was elected to the Venezuelan Senate, representing the state of Aragua. On 29 January 2000, he was appointed as the first executive vice president of Venezuela. Eleven months later, on December 26, with the majority vote of the National Assembly, he was appointed as Attorney General of the Republic, a position he held until November 2007. He was appointed Second Vice-President of the

2017 Constituent National Assembly The Constituent National Assembly ( es, Asamblea Nacional Constituyente; ANC) was a constituent assembly elected in 2017 to draft a new Constitution of Venezuela, constitution for Venezuela. Its members were elected 2017 Venezuelan Constituent As ...

on 4 August 2017 but he is replaced by Elvis Amoroso a month later.

Sanctions

In November 2017, Isaías Rodríguez was sanctioned by the United States

Office of Foreign Assets Control The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is a financial intelligence and enforcement agency of the U.S. Treasury Department. It administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions in support of U.S. national security and foreign policy ob ...

after the

2017 Venezuelan Constituent Assembly election Constituent Assembly elections were held in Venezuela on 30 July 2017 to elect the members of the 2017 Constituent National Assembly ( es, Asamblea Nacional Constituyente; ANC). Unlike the 1999 Constituent National Assembly, which was assembled ...

. In March 2018, Panama sanctioned 55 public officials, including Isaías Rodríguez. Also a
Panama Economic and Finance Ministry
During 2018 until 2019 he worked as the Venezuelan Ambassador in Italy. During the

2019 Venezuelan presidential crisis The Venezuelan presidential crisis is an ongoing political crisis concerning the leadership and the legitimate president of Venezuela; the office of the president has been contested since 10 January 2019, with the Responses to the Venezuelan p ...

, Rodríguez expressed concern for US sanctions on Venezuela. According to him, these sanctions prevent him to pay his workers and the Embassy debt has risen to about 9 million euros. Rodríguez resigned to his job as ambassador in May due to the tight budget of the embassy. In his resignation letter published on Twitter, he expressed support for "Maduro's battle". He writes that he leaves "without money" and that Italian banks have "closed its doors" to him.

References

Living people 1942 births Ambassadors of Venezuela to Italy 20th-century Venezuelan lawyers Democratic Action (Venezuela) politicians People's Electoral Movement (Venezuela) politicians Members of the Senate of Venezuela Vice presidents of Venezuela United Socialist Party of Venezuela politicians People from Valle de la Pascua People of the Crisis in Venezuela Members of the Venezuelan Constituent Assembly of 1999 Members of the Venezuelan Constituent Assembly of 2017 {{Venezuela-politician-stub