United States President Donald Trump declared on Saturday that Venezuelan airspace had been “closed”, without offering any further details, spiking tensions between Washington and Caracas amid months of military build-up in the Caribbean.
Venezuela has accused the US of a “colonialist threat” in Latin America, as millions of people in the country remain on edge. President Nicolas Maduro had earlier warned that Washington was fabricating claims as a pretext to justify military intervention in Venezuela. The Trump administration has deployed massive naval assets in the Southern Caribbean since launching a series of strikes on alleged drug boats in early September. Washington has not provided any proof that the targeted boats were involved in drug trafficking. At least 83 people have been killed in those attacks.
Ramping up pressure on Maduro last week, Washington designated what is known among Venezuelans as the Cartel de los Soles, or Cartel of the Suns in English, as a “foreign terrorist organization”.
The Trump administration says it is targeting Venezuela as part of a push to combat drug trafficking. However, political analysts and human rights observers warn Washington against laying the groundwork to unlawfully remove Maduro from power.
So, will Trump strike Venezuela after announcing the closure of Venezuelan airspace? Can the US military action be legally justified? And what is driving Trump’s hostile policy against Maduro? Within a few weeks into his second term, Trump nixed Venezuelan oil concessions granted by his predecessor, Joe Biden, imposed 25 percent tariffs on countries buying oil from Venezuela, and doubled the reward for the arrest of Maduro to $50m, designating him a “global terrorist leader”.
In recent weeks, Trump confirmed that he has authorised the CIA to carry out secret operations in Venezuela, as his administration deployed the world’s largest aircraft carrier, USS Gerald R Ford, other warships, thousands of troops, and F-35 stealth jets to the Caribbean.
Last Thursday, Trump said land strikes inside the country could come imminently.
Amid heightened military tensions, Trump reportedly spoke with Maduro last week, as per reporting by The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, before sanctions against Cartel de los Soles came into effect.
On November 25, Trump, on board Air Force One, was asked by reporters if he planned on speaking with Maduro. “I might talk to him. We’ll see. But we’re discussing that with the different staffs. We might talk,” Trump told reporters.
When asked why Trump wants to talk to a leader of the designated “foreign terrorist organization”, he took the moral high ground.
“If we can save lives, we can do things the easy way, that’s fine. And if we have to do it the hard way, that’s fine, too,” he replied.
Source: Here