European and Latin American ministers said Thursday that conditions were not ripe to send observers to December 6 parliamentary elections in Venezuela as they would neither be free nor fair.

The Venezuelan government of President Nicolas Maduro two weeks ago invited the leaders of the United Nations and European Union to send observers to monitor the elections.

But ministers in the International Contact Group of EU and Latin American countries said after their video conference on Thursday that this would not be possible under current circumstances.

“ICG members concluded that conditions are not met, at the moment, for a transparent, inclusive, free and fair electoral process,” the group said in a statement after the conference chaired by EU diplomatic chief Josep Borrell of Spain.

The group called on Venezuela to respect the democratically elected National Assembly, return control of political parties to their rightful administrators, end the disqualification and prosecution of political leaders, restore candidates’ rights to equal political participation, fully update the voter register, and allow full access to all media.

“The ICG notes that the current electoral timetable does not allow the deployment of an Election Observation Mission,” it said.

“Nor does it leave enough time and political space for the parties to negotiate the conditions for credible, free and fair elections,” the group said.

The United States has already said it will not contribute to “legitimizing yet another electoral fraud” in Venezuela after Maduro’s government invited the UN and the EU to monitor the elections.

Brazil called Thursday on the international community not to support the vote.

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In January 2019, National Assembly speaker Guaido challenged Maduro’s authority by declaring himself acting president, claiming Maduro had stolen his 2018 re-election in a rigged vote.

Guaido quickly received the backing of more than 50 countries including the United States.

The ICG groups European countries like Britain, France, Germany, Spain and Italy with a number of Latin American countries. Argentina is back in the group while Bolivia has left it.