Wars 2026 01/03 USA War with Venezuela

[Afhan]

@Lulldapull

 

[Saif]

China calls on US to 'immediately release' Venezuela's Maduro

China called on the United States on Sunday to immediately release Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro after Washington carried out a strike on Caracas and captured the leader.

en.prothomalo.com

China calls on US to 'immediately release' Venezuela's Maduro

AFP Beijing
Updated: 04 Jan 2026, 14: 06

This screengrab taken from the X account of Rapid Response 47, the official White House rapid response account, shows Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro (C) escorted by DEA agents inside the headquarters of the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in lower Manhattan, New York, on 3 January, 2026. AFP

China called on the United States on Sunday to immediately release Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro after Washington carried out a strike on Caracas and captured the leader.

"China calls on the US to ensure the personal safety of President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, release them at once, stop toppling the government of Venezuela," the Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement, calling the strike a "clear violation of international law".​

 

[Afhan]

 

[Saif]

https://thefinancialexpress.com.bd/views/opinions/the-venezuelan-dilemma

The Venezuelan dilemma

SYED FATTAHUL ALIM
Published :
Jan 06, 2026 00:24
Updated :
Jan 06, 2026 00:24

The sitting president of Venezuela has been, what the US said, 'captured' along with his wife, son and other officials as a fugitive evading law. Venezuela is a oil-and-mineral-rich country of the South American continent lying along the coast of North Atlantic Ocean and bordering the Caribbean Sea. If Venezuela is a sovereign nation, then it defies common sense as to how its president could be fugitive in the eyes of another sovereign country? But Nicolas Maduro, the president of Venezuela, has been 'arrested' by the US through a military operation carried out on Saturday (January 3, 2026) night. From the standpoint of the US military might, it was a meticulous and successful operation, as there was no bloodshed and no US service personnel died during the operation. However, the media is yet to come up with any detailed report on Venezuelan casualties during the US military offensive. It is reported that President Maduro is 'in custody' and will have to face trial on charge of what reports say, narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy and weapons offensive. His wife Cilia Flores, their son Nicolas Maduro Guerra and other Venezuelan officials held during the operation would also face various charges under the US law.

As a power vacuum has been created in Venezuela following Maduro's forcible capture, the US president Donald Trump said US would henceforth 'run' the country. It also baffles the mind how another country might run a sovereign country. For the time being, the vice president of the country, Delcy Rodriguez, who is known to be a pro-Chavez (Hugo Chavez, a revolutionary and former president of the country) will be in charge. So, she is also pro-Maduro by default as they both bear the same legacy of Hugo Chavez. So, when faced with the question of her cooperation with the US in administering the country, Trump said she (Delcy Rodriguez) had little choice (but to cooperate). One wonders what makes Trump so confident. For Trump has not yet said if the Venezuelan opposition leader, a darling of the US and the West, and winner of Nobel Peace Prize, Maria Corina Machado, would be in charge to fill Venezuela's present administrative vacuum. Ironically though, Trump reportedly insinuated that she (Machado) didn't have the gravitas to potentially lead the country. If the report is true, then Trump's suggestion that Venezuela's vice president Delcy Rodriguez has no choice makes sense.

But some uncomfortable questions still remain unanswered: How could US Delta Force carry out its covert mission to dislodge President Maduro from power and abduct him, his wife, son and others practically without any resistance from the Venezuelan army? How could Venezuela's military fail to protect its president? What was the country's intelligence department doing as their president was being taken captive by outside forces? Were they then sleeping or looking the other way? Even if the odds stacked against the military brigade responsible for immediate security of the president, the Presidential Honor Guard, were overwhelming, why, as it appears, did they not fire even a single shot to protect their president? It all sounds surreal! Was it then a set-up about which President Maduro was quite clueless and a helpless victim?

Many such unanswered questions would haunt the curious observers of Venezuelan politics for some time. However, what is clear is that the Venezuelan ruling elites-some members of the army, the bureaucracy and the political leadership both in power and in the opposition-can be bought. It seems the ideology of Bolivarianism and socialism of the 21st century, which lately became the governing ideology of Chavismo (named after Hugo Chavez, initiator of Bolivarianism) has meanwhile run out of steam. Whatever the case, the world is now witnessing a peacemaker president Trump turning into a warmongering one! Other global powers-Russia and China-who are known to be the allies of the country's erstwhile ruling regime, are yet to react meaningfully to the latest development in Venezuela and the Caribbean region.​

 

[Saif]

War on sovereignty of Venezuela not narcotics

The U.S. military operation resulting in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife represents a defining moment in the Trump administration's fight against alleged drug trafficking. The administration swiftly framed the action as a lawful criminal enforcement against na

thefinancialexpress.com.bd

War on sovereignty of Venezuela not narcotics

Wasi Ahmed
Published :
Jan 06, 2026 23:28
Updated :
Jan 06, 2026 23:28

DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) agents captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores out of a helicopter in New York City, January 5. — REUTERS


The U.S. military operation resulting in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife represents a defining moment in the Trump administration's fight against alleged drug trafficking. The administration swiftly framed the action as a lawful criminal enforcement against narco-terrorism. Almost simultaneously, senior officials announced plans for the United States to assume a supervisory role over Venezuela's governance and to divert the country's oil revenues to offset the costs of the operation.

Independent legal experts have been nearly unanimous in their denunciation of the operation as unlawful under both U.S. and international law. The forcible seizure of a sitting head of state on foreign soil is widely regarded as a grave violation of national sovereignty. Such actions, critics warn, establish a dangerous precedent that erodes the already fragile norms restraining the use of force in international relations. By cloaking a military incursion in the language of criminal justice, the administration has blurred distinctions that are foundational to the international legal order.

The operation has also triggered serious constitutional concerns at home. The unilateral use of force occurred without explicit Congressional authorisation, raising questions about the executive branch's adherence to the separation of powers. Members of Congress from across the political spectrum have objected to the absence of legislative oversight, noting that no declaration of war or comparable authorisation was sought or granted. For many lawmakers, the episode exemplifies a troubling expansion of presidential war-making authority, one that sidesteps the constitutional role of Congress in matters of war and peace.

Central to the administration's public defence has been the claim that military action against Venezuela is necessary to combat drug trafficking. President Trump has repeatedly described Venezuela as a hub of narcotics smuggling and has cited strikes on alleged trafficking infrastructure as evidence of resolve against transnational crime. Yet, independent data sharply undermine this narrative. Venezuela is not a principal source of drugs entering the United States. Cocaine production is overwhelmingly concentrated in Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia, with the bulk of that supply transiting through Central America and Mexico before reaching U.S. markets. The most acute contemporary drug threat to the United States -- synthetic opioids such as fentanyl -- originates largely in clandestine laboratories in the United States and Mexico, not in Venezuela.

Despite these realities, the Trump administration has designated Venezuelan entities, including the so-called "Cartel of the Suns," as terrorist organisations, thereby invoking extraordinary legal authorities. This move stands in stark contrast to U.S. policy towards far more significant drug trafficking challenges closer to home. Mexico and Colombia, long acknowledged as central nodes in global narcotics flows, have never been subjected to comparable unilateral U.S. military intervention. Instead, Washington has relied for decades on cooperation -- intelligence sharing, extradition treaties, and joint law enforcement operations. The abandonment of these established counter-narcotics frameworks in Venezuela, in favour of kinetic military action, reveals a striking inconsistency in how anti-drug rhetoric is applied.

Equally revealing is the administration's selective invocation of democracy and human rights. Trump's portrayal of Maduro as a dictator has been a central justification for intervention. Yet this posture sits uneasily alongside the administration's cordial relationships with other leaders widely recognised as authoritarian, some of whom have been welcomed as honoured guests at the White House. The absence of comparable pressure or punitive measures against these regimes undermines claims that the intervention in Venezuela is grounded in defence of democratic norms.

Further complicating the administration's narrative are intelligence findings that contradict its most alarming allegations. A declassified U.S. intelligence memorandum concluded that there was no credible evidence that Maduro personally directed Venezuelan criminal gangs to operate inside the United States. This assessment weakens the factual basis for portraying the Venezuelan state as an extension of transnational organised crime and calls into question the necessity of such an extreme response.

Regional leaders have been especially forthright in articulating what they see as the true drivers of U.S. policy. Colombian President Gustavo Petro has argued that Washington's pressure campaign against Venezuela is motivated less by anti-narcotics concerns than by a desire to control the country's vast oil reserves. This critique gained additional force when President Trump himself suggested that U.S. involvement could be financed through Venezuelan oil revenues-an unintended admission of economic motivation. Such statements reinforce long-standing suspicions in Latin America that greed for resource, rather than humanitarian or security imperatives, lies at the heart of the U.S. intervention. Taken together, these point to a military incursion that is less about combating drug trafficking than about asserting control over a resource-rich state led by a government inconvenient to U.S. geopolitical interests. The operation's dubious legality, its inconsistency with established counter-narcotics priorities in countries like Mexico and Colombia, and the breadth of international condemnation suggest a policy driven by strategic self-interest rather than the enforcement of law or a commitment to democracy.

The intervention can reasonably be termed as an imperial aggression masquerading as narcotics enforcement. By undermining international law, bypassing domestic constitutional safeguards and inflaming regional mistrust, the operation risks destabilising hemispheric security and deepening scepticism of U.S. intentions in Latin America for years to come.​