NewsFeed Nicolas Maduro was an “illegitimate so-called president” and not a head of state, US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz asserted at the UN Security Council. The Trump administration has repeatedly claimed the leader’s abduction was a law enforcement rather than military operation. Published On 5 Jan 20265 Jan 2026 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Source link
For many years before becoming president, Donald Trump publicly criticised the George W Bush administration over its decision to launch the war on Iraq. And yet, today, in his second term as president, he finds himself presiding over a military debacle that is quite reminiscent of Bush’s. Trump ordered a military intervention to remove an antagonistic foreign leader, based on a flimsy argument of national security, with the goal of accessing that country’s oil. In both cases, we see a naive confidence that the United States can simply achieve its goals through regime change. US intervention into Venezuela reeks of the same hubris that surrounded the Iraq invasion two decades ago. Yet there are also important differences to consider. The most important distinguishing feature of the operation in Venezuela is its lack of an overarching vision. On Saturday after Trump finished an hour-long news conference alongside his secretaries of defence and state, it was not clear what the plan was for Venezuela going forward, or if there was a plan at all. His statements threatening …
In the early hours of January 3, the United States’ Delta Force abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, from the presidential residence in the capital, Caracas. The operation, which was paired with attacks on the Venezuelan capital that killed at least 40 people, according to Venezuelan officials, extracted the country’s first couple to New York in the US, where they are expected to be put on trial as early as Monday. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list But who is Cilia Flores, Venezuela’s so-called “first combatant”? Early life Flores, 69, was born on October 15, 1956, in Tinaquillo in central Venezuela. She grew up in areas of western Caracas that CNN has described as “working-class neighbourhoods”. She graduated from Universidad Santa Maria in Caracas as a lawyer specialising in labour and criminal law. Her rise to prominence came when she led the team that provided legal assistance to military leader Hugo Chavez in 1992, after he attempted to overthrow then-Venezuelan President Carlos Andres Perez. Flores reportedly helped secure Chavez’s …
NewsFeed President Donald Trump says the US will ‘take back’ Venezuela’s oil, arguing it should be used to reimburse Washington for past spending. According to Trump, the US will ‘run’ Venezuela after having seized President Nicolas Maduro and taken him to New York. Published On 4 Jan 20264 Jan 2026 Click here to share on social media share2 Share Source link
