VENEZUELAN President Nicolas Maduro has moved to put parliament back on a legal footing as a prelude to resuming talks with the opposition.

The president told viewers of his Sundays with Maduro show that he had asked the Dialogue Commission chief, former vice-president Jorge Rodriguez, to draw up a document in agreement with the Democratic Unity Roundtable (Mud) coalition to “facilitate the legalisation of the national assembly.”

The National Justice Tribunal (TSJ), Venezuela’s highest court, declared the Mud-controlled assembly to be operating unconstitutionally last year after it swore in three MPs who had been suspended over allegations of electoral fraud.