Trump says US has “captured” Venezuelan President Maduro and his wife in “large scale strike” – latest
Maduro said he was open to US talks on drug trafficking in interview this weekpublished at 08:41 GMT
On Thursday, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said he was open to talks with the US on drug trafficking and oil “wherever and whenever they want”.
In the interview with Venezuelan state TV, Maduro also avoided responding to a statement by US President Donald Trump that the US had hit a docking facility in Venezuela – marking the first such attack inside the country reportedly carried out by the CIA.
A few days before Maduro’s interview, Trump said the US carried out a strike on a “dock area” linked to alleged Venezuelan drug boats, adding there had been a “major explosion” where “they load the boats up with drugs”.
It follows weeks of Trump’s ramped up pressure on Maduro, who he accuses of “emptying his prisons and insane asylums” and “forcing” its inmates to migrate to the US – along with using oil money to fund drug-related crime.
Since September, the US has launched 30 strikes on what it says are drug-smuggling boats, targeting vessels in the Pacific and the Caribbean.
More than 110 people have been killed since the US carried out its first attack on a boat in international waters on 2 September.
