Very funny pictures maxolon It's not just less economic muscle that is freezing Venezuela's outreach, said Carlos Romero, an international relations expert at the Central University of Venezuela. Maduro's inability to replicate Chavez's charisma and a rapprochement with the West by Iran and Syria, whose previous hard-line stance Chavez embraced, are undermining the politics of confrontation that the late Venezuelan leader relished, Romero said.