21/05/2019 (Agence Europe) – "We do not believe that the dissolution of the National Assembly is a solution to the crisis [as would] the holding of free and fair presidential elections", said Maja Kocijancic, spokeswomen for the European External Action Service, on Tuesday 21 May, the day after President Nicolás Maduro announced the early date of elections to renew the National Assembly, the only political entity in the hands of Venezuela's political opposition. For the EU, the National Assembly chaired by the self-proclaimed President Juan Guaidó is "the only democratically elected entity". Europeans do not recognise either the Constituent Assembly, created in the summer of 2017 (see EUROPE 11843/3) to bypass the National Assembly, or the legitimacy of the presidential elections that renewed Mr Maduro's mandate (see EUROPE 12170/17). (MB)