Maduro accepts talks offer with opposition

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said Tuesday his government was prepared to meet the opposition for talks, offering a glimpse of a breakthrough in a political standoff marked by months of deadly protests.

Maduro made the surprise announcement in a televised cabinet meeting in Caracas.

He told his ministers he would accept to undertake talks brokered by Dominican Republic President Danilo Medina and ex-Spanish premier Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.

"Zapatero and President Medina know very well that I have been a promoter of this dialogue and I accept this new day of dialogue," Maduro said.

Maduro appointed influential Caracas politician Jorge Rodriguez as his representative at the talks, and said he would leave for the Dominican Republic "in the next few hours."

The opposition announced in turn that it would hold an exploratory meeting with the Dominican president.

However, it insisted it did not mean it was the beginning of formal talks with the government.

"The time for symbolic gestures is over," the opposition coalition Democratic Unity Roundtable said.

"To enter into serious negotiation, we demand immediate actions that demonstrate a real willingness to resolve the national problems and not to win time," it said.

Oil-rich Venezuela is facing a growing economic crisis that has caused shortages of food and medicine as it faces the prospect of default to its Russian and Chinese creditors.

Maduro had to weather falling oil prices and a wave of opposition protests that left 125 people dead between April and July.