Venezuela 'on alert,' closes Curacao border ahead of aid shipment
CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela's military said Tuesday it was on "alert" at its frontiers following threats by US President Donald Trump and ordered its border with Curacao closed ahead of a planned aid shipment.
Opposition leader and self-declared interim president Juan Guaido vowed to bring aid in from various points Saturday "one way or another" despite military efforts to block it.
But commanders doubled down on their allegiance to President Nicolas Maduro after Trump warned them to abandon him.
"The armed forces will remain deployed and on alert along the borders... to avoid any violations of territorial integrity," said Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino.
Regional commander Vladimir Quintero later confirmed media reports that Venezuela had ordered the suspension of air and sea links with Curacao and the neighboring Netherlands Antilles islands of Aruba and Bonaire.
Shipments of food and medicine for Venezuelans suffering in the country's economic crisis have become a focus of the power struggle between Maduro and Guaido.
Aid is being stored in Colombia near the Venezuelan border and Guaido aims also to bring in consignments via Brazil and Curacao.
A Brazilian presidential spokesman said the country was cooperating with the United States to supply aid to Venezuela but would leave it to Venezuelans to take the goods over the border.
Maduro says the aid plan is a smokescreen for a US invasion. He blames US sanctions and "economic war" for Venezuela's crisis.
'No safe harbor'
Guaido, the 35-year-old leader of the Venezuelan legislature, has appealed to military leaders to switch allegiance to him and let the aid through.
He has offered military commanders an amnesty if they abandon Maduro.
But the military high command has so far maintained its public backing for Maduro -- seen as key to keeping him in power.
"We reiterate unrestrictedly our obedience, subordination and loyalty" to Maduro, Padrino said.
Guaido posted a series of tweets calling by name on senior military leaders commanding border posts to abandon Maduro.
He has branded Maduro illegitimate, saying the elections that returned the socialist leader to power last year were fixed.
The United States and some 50 other countries back Guaido as interim president.
Trump has refused to rule out US military action in Venezuela. He raised the pressure on Monday, issuing a warning to the Venezuelan military.
He told them that if they continue to support Maduro, "you will find no safe harbor, no easy exit and no way out. You will lose everything."
Padrino rejected Trump's threat, branding the US president "arrogant."
If foreign powers try to help install a new government by force, they will have to do so "over our dead bodies," Padrino said.
'Pack of lies'
Despite sitting on the world's biggest oil reserves, Venezuela is gripped by a humanitarian crisis, with a shortage of food and medicine.
It has suffered four years of recession marked by hyperinflation that the International Monetary Fund says will reach 10 million percent this year.
An estimated 2.3 million Venezuelans have left the country since 2015.
Guaido says 300,000 people face death without the aid but Maduro denies there is a humanitarian crisis.
Padrino said the military would not be "blackmailed" by "a pack of lies and manipulations."
Maduro said that 300 tonnes of Russian aid would reach Venezuela on Wednesday. He previously announced the arrival of goods from China, Cuba and Russia, his main international allies.
In a series of tweets, Guaido urged supporters to write to the generals "from the heart, with arguments, without violence, without insults," to win them over.
Battle of the bands
Guaido says he has enlisted the support of 700,000 people to help bring in the aid on Saturday and is aiming for a million in total.
He thanked Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain for pledging "more than $18 million for the humanitarian aid."
British entrepreneur Richard Branson said he will hold a pro-aid concert just over the border in Colombia on Friday.
British rock star Peter Gabriel and Colombian pop singer Carlos Vives are among those scheduled to perform.
Former Pink Floyd singer Roger Waters weighed in on Maduro's side in a video broadcast on Venezuelan state media, criticizing Branson and Gabriel and said the aid was being politicized.
Maduro's government plans to stage a rival concert on its side of the border.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro accuses Colombia of being behind an "attack" with an explosive-laden drone he said targeted him on Saturday (Sunday, Manila time).
Speaking shortly after state television showed him cut off mid-speech in front of a Caracas military parade by a bang, Maduro says a "flying object exploded in front of me" and blamed the incident on Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos.
"It was an attack to kill me, they tried to assassinate me today," Maduro says in a state broadcast. "I have no doubt that the name Juan Manuel Santos is behind this attack." — AFP
The government of Nicolas Maduro and the Venezuelan opposition broke a political stalemate Saturday with a broad social accord, and the US government responded by allowing a major US oil company to resume operations in Venezuela.
The accord heralded a potential easing of a grinding economic and political crisis in Venezuela.
It paves the way for the United Nations to oversee a trust fund of frozen assets of the Maduro government to be used for a variety of social projects in the South American country, including programs related to education, health, food security, flood response and electricity.
"We have identified a set of resources belonging to the Venezuelan state, frozen in the global financial system, to which it is possible to access," said Dag Nylander, an envoy from Norway, which facilitated the negotiations. The amount to be released was not specified.
The agreement, signed in Mexico, ended 15 months of stalemate between the two sides, potentially easing a massive flow of refugees from Venezuela throughout the region and even impacting world oil markets.
Maduro praised the deal on Twitter, saying it "opens the way for a new chapter for Venezuela, to keep advancing towards the peace and well-being that all Venezuelans yearn for." — AFP
A US delegation arrived in Venezuela Monday to discuss a "bilateral agenda," extending discussions between Caracas and Washington initiated in March, said Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
National Assembly speaker, Jorge Rodriguez, "is receiving a delegation from the government of the United States, an important delegation that arrived two hours ago in Venezuela," Maduro announced on national public television VTV at around 8:00 pm (0000 GMT).
Rodriguez is also the Venezuelan government's negotiator in talks with the opposition, which have been at a standstill since last October.
Washington had sent a high-level delegation to Caracas in early March, a few days after Russia invaded Ukraine. Several observers said the move was aimed at trying to distance Caracas from one of its main allies, Moscow, and discussing an easing of US sanctions on Venezuelan oil after the invasion caused a spike in global fuel prices.
The White House confirmed the meeting but only said the discussions had focused in particular on American "energy security." Before its rupture with Washington, Venezuela exported almost all of its oil production to the United States.
After those discussions, Caracas released two Americans detained in Venezuela in what was widely seen as a goodwill gesture.
In May, Washington announced it would ease some limited sanctions against Venezuela, including one linked to the oil company Chevron, to promote dialogue between Maduro's government and the opposition. -- AFP
The International Criminal Court has opened an office in Venezuela as part of an investigation into alleged human rights abuses during anti-government protests in 2017, authorities announced on Thursday.
The ICC opened a formal investigation into the alleged rights violations last November and signed a memorandum of understanding with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro which stated that the South American country would take "measures" to ensure the court would be able to work.
"It's a very important step, very significant. This is not for appearance's sake, it is something concrete that will allow me to carry out my responsibilities," said ICC prosecutor Karim Khan alongside Maduro at the presidential palace in Caracas.
"Venezuela will now have this office that will provide us with an effective level of dialogue in real time that is more efficient," said Maduro, who has been in power since 2013. — AFP
President Nicolas Maduro says that EU monitors of Venezuelan local elections were "enemies" and "spies," denying their assertion that last week's voting was marred by irregularities.
"Those who came as enemies, the delegation of spies from the European Union, found not a bit of evidence to criticize the electoral system," Maduro says of the November 21 vote for gubernatorial and mayoral posts.
Candidates that back the Maduro government were declared the winners in the vast majority of the races. — AFP
Venezuela's opposition calls on President Nicolas Maduro's government to resume talks to resolve their differences, after the ruling party withdrew from the latest round that was to begin Sunday in Mexico.
"We urge the other side to resume the sessions in Mexico as soon as possible to produce the necessary agreements," Gerardo Blyde, head of the opposition team, says at a press conference in Mexico City.
The meeting was to run until Wednesday. — AFP
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