Why is Trump threatening Venezuela's Maduro?
2 days ago
Vanessa BuschschlüterLatin America editor, BBC News Online
ReutersUS President Donald Trump has been ramping up pressure on Venezuela's leader, President Nicolás Maduro.
In a sharp escalation of Washington's campaign, on 16 December the US president ordered a naval blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers entering and leaving Venezuela - less than a week after US forces seized a sanctioned tanker off the country's coast.
US warships have been deployed within striking distance of the South American country and dozens of people have been killed in attacks on boats alleged to have been carrying drugs.
Who is Nicolás Maduro?
ReutersNicolás Maduro rose to prominence under the leadership of left-wing President Hugo Chávez and his United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).
Maduro, a former bus driver and union leader, succeeded Chávez and has been president since 2013.
During the 26 years that Chávez and Maduro have been in power, their party has gained control of key institutions including the National Assembly, much of the judiciary, and the electoral council.
In 2024, Maduro was declared winner of the presidential election, even though voting tallies collected by the opposition suggested that its candidate, Edmundo González, had won by a landslide.
González had replaced the main opposition leader, María Corina Machado, on the ballot after she was barred from running for office.
She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in October for "her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy".
Machado defied a travel ban and made her way to Oslo in December to collect the award after months in hiding.
She said that she planned to return to Venezuela, a move which would put her at risk of arrest by the Venezuelan authorities, who have declared her a "fugitive".
Why is Trump focusing on Venezuela?
Trump blames Maduro for the arrival of hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants in the US.
They are among close to eight million Venezuelans estimated to have fled the country's economic crisis and repression since 2013.
Without providing evidence, Trump has accused Maduro of "emptying his prisons and insane asylums" and "forcing" its inmates to migrate to the US.
Trump has also focused on fighting the influx of drugs - especially fentanyl and cocaine - into the US.
He has designated two Venezuelan criminal groups - Tren de Aragua and Cartel de los Soles - as Foreign Terrorist Organisations (FTOs) and has alleged that the latter is led by Maduro himself.
Trump's administration has also doubled the reward for information leading to the president's capture.
Maduro has vehemently denied being a cartel leader and has accused the US of using its "war on drugs" as an excuse to try to depose him and get its hands on Venezuela's vast oil reserves.
Analysts have pointed out that Cartel de los Soles is not a hierarchical group but a term used to describe corrupt officials who have allowed cocaine to transit through Venezuela.
In a post on his Truth Social social media platform, the US president accused the Maduro government of using "stolen" oil to "finance themselves, Drug Terrorism, Human Trafficking, Murder, and Kidnapping".
He said that the Maduro government itself had also been designated an FTO.
The Venezuelan government called Trump's post a "grotesque threat" and accused the US president of intending to steal the country's wealth.
Nicolás Maduro: The leader who promised to win 'by hook or by crook'
What is Cartel de los Soles, which the US is labelling as a terrorist organisation?
Why has the US sent warships to the Caribbean?
The US has deployed 15,000 troops and a range of aircraft carriers, guided-missile destroyers, and amphibious assault ships to the Caribbean.
The stated aim of the deployment - the largest to the region since the US invaded Panama in 1989 - is to stop the flow of fentanyl and cocaine to the US.
Among the ships is the USS Gerald Ford, the world's largest aircraft carrier. US helicopters reportedly took off from it before US forces seized an oil tanker off Venezuela on 10 December.
The US said the tanker had been "used to transport sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran". Venezuela described the action as an act of "international piracy".
US Navy/ReutersThe USS Gerald Ford played a key role when the US seized an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast
In recent months, US forces have also carried out more than 20 strikes in international waters on boats alleged to have been carrying drugs. More than 90 people have been killed.
The Trump administration argues that it is involved in a non-international armed conflict with the alleged drug traffickers, whom it accuses of conducting irregular warfare against the US.
The US has also described those on board as "narco terrorists", but legal experts say the strikes are not against "lawful military targets". The first attack - on 2 September - has drawn particular scrutiny as there was not one but two strikes, with survivors of the first hit killed in the second.
A former chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court told the BBC that the US military campaign more generally fell into the category of a planned, systematic attack against civilians during peacetime.
In response, the White House said it had acted in line with the laws of armed conflict to protect the US from cartels "trying to bring poison to our shores... destroying American lives".
What are the 'ghost ships' Venezuela is using to evade oil sanctions?
What we know about US seizure of oil tanker off Venezuela
US strikes on Latin American 'drug boats': What do we know, and are they legal?
Is Venezuela flooding the US with drugs?
Counternarcotic experts say that Venezuela is a relatively minor player in global drug trafficking, acting as a transit country through which drugs produced elsewhere are smuggled.
Its neighbour, Colombia, is the world's largest producer of cocaine but most of it is thought to enter the US by other routes, not via Venezuela.
According to a US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) report from 2020, almost three quarters of the cocaine reaching the US is estimated to be trafficked via the Pacific with just a small percentage coming via fast boats in the Caribbean.
While most of the early strikes the US has carried out were in the Caribbean, more recent ones have focused on the Pacific.
In September, Trump told US military leaders that the boats targeted "are stacked up with bags of white powder that's mostly fentanyl and other drugs, too".
Fentanyl is a synthetic drug which is 50 times more potent than heroin and has become the main drug responsible for opioid overdose deaths in the US.
On 15 December, Trump signed an executive order designating fentanyl as a "weapon of mass destruction", arguing that it was "closer to a chemical weapon than a narcotic".
However, fentanyl is produced mainly in Mexico and reaches the US almost exclusively via land through its southern border.
Venezuela is not mentioned as a country of origin for fentanyl smuggled into the US in the DEA's 2025 National Drug Threat Assessment.
How much oil does Venezuela export, and who buys it?
Oil is the Maduro government's main source of foreign revenue, with profits from the sector financing more than half of the government's budget.
It currently exports about 900,000 barrels per day. China is by far its biggest buyer.
However, although a US assessment suggests Venezuela has the world's largest proven crude oil reserves, it says that it does relatively little with them.
Venezuela produced only 0.8% of global crude oil in 2023, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), due to technical and budgetary challenges.
After announcing that the tanker had been seized, Trump told reporters: "I assume we're going to keep the oil."
The US has previously denied Venezuela's allegations that moves against Maduro's government were an attempt to secure access to the country's untapped reserves.
Venezuela says Trump wants its oil. But is that the case?
Could the US carry out strikes on Venezuela?
Trump has confirmed that he spoke to Maduro on the phone on 21 November.
While he did not reveal what was said in the call, Reuters news agency reported that Trump gave Maduro a one-week ultimatum to leave Venezuela along with his close family. It said that Maduro did not take him up on the offer of safe passage.
One day after the deadline expired, Trump declared the airspace around Venezuela closed.
Trump has already threatened to take action against Venezuelan drug traffickers "by land", but has not specified how such an operation would unfold.
Trump's press secretary has also not ruled out the possibility of US troops being deployed on the ground in Venezuela, telling reporters that "there's options at the president's disposal that are on the table".
She did not elaborate further on the options but military analysts have for weeks pointed out that the US deployment in the Caribbean is much larger than needed for a counternarcotics operation.
---
Venezuela denounces Trump's order for ship blockade as 'warmongering threats'
2 days ago
US President Donald Trump has ordered "a total and complete" blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers entering and leaving Venezuela - a move denounced by Caracas as "warmongering threats".
Trump wrote that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's government had been designated a foreign terrorist organisation (FTO), which had also engaged in "Drug Smuggling, and Human Trafficking".
His remarks come after the US seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela last week, a significant action in light of the South American nation's reliance on oil.
The US has also recently conducted deadly strikes on alleged Venezuelan drug-smuggling boats, and has significantly built up its naval presence nearby.
Trump's post did not give further detail of how the wide-ranging blockade on sanctioned oil tankers would be enforced.
As of last week, more than 30 of the 80 ships in Venezuelan waters or approaching the country were under US sanctions, according to data compiled by TankerTrackers.com.
Multiple new US sanctions on ships said to be carrying Venezuelan oil were issued after the tanker was seized. Sanctions were also placed on some of President Maduro's relatives and on businesses associated with what the US called his illegitimate regime.
In his Truth Social post on Tuesday, Trump wrote that Venezuela was "completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America". He added that it would "only get bigger" and "be like nothing they have ever seen before".
Trump also accused Maduro's government of using "stolen" oil to "finance themselves, Drug Terrorism, Human Trafficking, Murder, and Kidnapping".
Tuesday's post from Trump suggested that a label the US had previously applied only to Maduro was now being widened to his whole government.
Last month, the US formally alleged that the Venezuelan Cartel de los Soles group was an FTO. The designation meant that Maduro was effectively designated as terrorist as well, because he was alleged to be group's leader - which he denies.
In response to the recent US actions, Venezuela - home to the world's largest proven oil reserves - has accused Washington of seeking to steal its resources.
Trump has repeatedly accused Venezuela of drug smuggling, and since September the US military has killed about 100 people with its strikes on boats that were allegedly carrying fentanyl and other illegal drugs to the US.
However, it has provided no public evidence that these vessels were carrying drugs, be it fentanyl - which is mainly produced in Mexico - or cocaine.
Another ship accused of drug trafficking was destroyed by the US military on Wednesday. US officials say four men were killed in the strike, which took place in the eastern Pacific Ocean.
What are the 'ghost ships' Venezuela is using to evade oil sanctions?
US military build-up in Caribbean has shadows of the past - but differences are stark
Venezuela says Trump wants its oil. But is that the case?
Venezuela's economy is heavily dependent on oil exports, even though the amount of oil it actually produces is relatively small given that the country is home to the world's largest proven reserves.
When announcing the tanker seizure off Venezuela's coast last week, the White House said the vessel in question, called the Skipper, had been involved in "illicit oil shipping" and would be taken to a US port.
Venezuela's government decried the move, with Maduro saying the US "kidnapped the crew" and "stole" the ship.
The US had been building up its military presence in the Caribbean Sea, which borders Venezuela to the north, in the weeks and months before the raid.
The build-up has involved thousands of troops and the USS Gerald Ford – the world's largest aircraft carrier – being positioned within striking distance of Venezuela.
Congressman Joaquin Castro, a Democrat representing Texas, said Trump's "naval blockade is unquestionably an act of war".
He added that US lawmakers would on Thursday vote on a resolution "directing the president to end hostilities with Venezuela".
The US, under both Trump and former President Joe Biden, has opposed the Maduro government for years and pressed for him to be removed by imposing stringent sanctions.
Maduro's government has been accused of rights abuses by the wider international community for many years. Venezuela's opposition, as well as many nations including the US, denounced last year's election as rigged and say his rule is therefore illegitimate.
On Tuesday, the UN human rights chief, Volker Türk, warned that the country's "crackdown on civic space has intensified, suffocating people's freedoms".
---
US military build-up in Caribbean has shadows of the past - but differences are stark
Tracking build-up of US military planes and warships near Venezuela
As Trump targets Venezuela, its allies Russia and China show little signs of support
Nicolás Maduro
Venezuela
Venezuela crisis
Donald Trump
United States
No comments:
Post a Comment