Perpetual misery in Venezuela is dividing South America’s leaders along generational lines as older comrades, led by President Lula da Silva of Brazil, cheer on the Chavistas, while younger presidents sour on the Bolivarian revolution’s humanitarian horrors. 

Mr. da Silva hosted a South American leader summit this week, aiming to strengthen solidarity and cooperation in the region. Instead, the presence of President Maduro of Venezuela shone light on divisions among the summiteers, who disagree about the state of human rights in his country. 

Mr. da Silva, a veteran of Latin America’s socialist vanguard, ignored Caracas’s authoritarianism and said each country has the right to decide its political regime. A younger generation of leaders, led by Presidents Boric of Chile and Lacalle Pou of Uruguay, took the Venezuelan caudillo to task.

Mr. Maduro’s presence was not a surprise, considering the “regional appetite” to normalize relations with Venezuela, the director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Ryan Berg, tells the Sun. Mr. da Silva’s comments denying the reality on the ground in Venezuela, on the other hand, jarred some of the leaders. 

“I reckon this moment will be a watershed for the region,” Mr. Berg says, “in terms of signaling that polarization and specious ideas of ‘solidarity’ with fellow leftists have shown that even basic questions like what constitutes minimal standards for democracy are questioned.”

The 77-year-old Mr. da Silva met with his Venezuelan counterpart on Monday to welcome a “new era” of cooperation between their countries, which was severed in 2015. “It’s a historic moment,” Mr. da Silva said. He added that Mr. Maduro is the victim of false allegations that he is an authoritarian. “Maduro knows the narrative they built against Venezuela for so long,” he said. 

Mr. da Silva’s comments received quick pushback. The conditions in Venezuela are not a “narrative” but a “serious reality,” Mr. Boric, 37, said, adding he saw the tragedy through Venezuelan migrants arriving in Chile. 

While he acknowledged he is happy to have Mr. Maduro back in the international forum, Mr. Boric said it doesn’t mean they should ignore Venezuela’s problems. Human rights, he added, should always be respected, regardless of the political branch of the government. 

“For me, as a leftist president, it is important to confront Maduro head-on for the first time in an international forum,” Mr. Boric said. “But we also ask the United States and the European Union to end sanctions, which weaken peoples and not governments.”

Mr. Berg says that for younger leaders the idea that left-wingers don’t speak against other left-wingers is no longer set in stone, which explains the change in attitude toward Mr. Maduro. “Specious ideas of ‘solidarity’ and ‘sister republics’ meant that you couldn’t do such a thing,” he says. By highlighting Venezuela’s human rights abuses, Mr. Boric is breaking that orthodoxy. 

“I think many of us are hoping that future leftists are more like Boric, willing to call a spade a spade. It’s quite refreshing.” Mr. Berg says.

Amplifying Mr. Boric, Mr. Lacalle Pou, 44, also rejected Mr. da Silva’s comments and said he was “surprised” Venezuela’s situation was called a narrative. “You already know what we think about Venezuela and the government of Venezuela,” Mr. Lacalle Pou said. “The worst thing we can do is cover the sun with a finger.”

Mr. da Silva rejected the criticism. “Nobody is obliged to agree with anyone,” and Venezuela must be respected, he said. “I always defended the idea that each country is sovereign to decide its political regime, what kind of elections it will have, and to debate internal things,” Mr. da Silva said. 

Human rights groups have long highlighted violations in Venezuela, including the use of excessive force against and repression of protesters and the press. Mr. Maduro has refused to return to the negotiating table with the opposition over a roadmap for conducting fair and free elections in the country, scheduled for 2024.

An economic collapse has left Venezuelans without access to basic resources such as sufficient food and adequate healthcare. More than seven million Venezuelans have fled the country since 2015, according to the International Monetary Fund. 

Mr. da Silva invited South American leaders to meet at Brasilia this week to showcase himself as a leader and revive a regional grouping, Unasur, which he created in 2008 along with Presidents Chavez of Venezuela and Kirchner of Argentina. The institution has been on hiatus since 2015. Argentina, Brazil, Venezuela, Bolivia, Surinam, Guyana, and Peru are the only active members. 

Countries such as Uruguay, Ecuador, Colombia, Paraguay, and Chile have not shown interest in participating in the group. At the summit, Mr. Lacalle Pou asked his South American counterparts to stop creating new institutions, which end up being “ideological clubs.” 

President Fernandez of Argentina, 66, who has long supported Mr. Maduro, met bilaterally with the Venezuelan and called for the return of Caracas to international forums. Like other summit participants, he condemned the sanctions on “two American countries that are suffering,” referring to Cuba and Venezuela. 

The bilateral meeting was sharply criticized by Argentina’s opposition and in the press. Many said the president “embarrassed” them and offended those Venezuelans that left their country and found refuge in Argentina. 

“Our cause is that of democracy and respect for human rights,” the governor of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires and opposition candidate for the upcoming presidential elections, Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, said. “My solidarity is with all the victims of the dictatorships in Latin America.”