Palm Beach, Florida
\n \u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n The United States continued its pressure campaign against Venezuela on Saturday as President Donald Trump issued a broad directive on social media, warning airlines, pilots and criminal networks to avoid Venezuelan airspace.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cPlease consider the airspace above and surrounding Venezuela to be closed in its entirety,\u201d he wrote in a Truth Social post.\n <\/p>\n
\n The announcement marks the latest turn of the wheel as the Trump administration intensifies its efforts to force Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro out of office. Officially, the Trump administration says it is working to cut down on illegal flows of migrants and drugs \u2014 but regime change<\/a> is a possible side effect of those efforts.\n <\/p>\n \n Venezuela\u2019s foreign minister denounced Trump\u2019s Saturday directive, calling it a \u201ccolonialist threat\u201d that constitutes an \u201cextravagant, illegal, and unjustified aggression against the people of Venezuela.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n The US can\u2019t close another country\u2019s airspace. The Federal Aviation Administration last week warned<\/a> major airlines of a \u201cpotentially hazardous situation\u201d when flying over Venezuela and urged them to exercise caution. Direct flights by US passenger or cargo carriers to Venezuela have been suspended since 2019, but some US airlines fly over the country for South American flights.\n <\/p>\n \n As Trump has sought to clamp down on illegal flows of migrants and drugs from the South American nation, in recent weeks the president acknowledged he had signed off on plans for the CIA to operate<\/a> inside Venezuela. And Trump designated Maduro and his government allies as members of a foreign terrorist organization<\/a> earlier this week, a move administration officials argue will give the US expanded military options for striking inside Venezuela. On Thursday, Trump suggested land strikes<\/a> inside the country could come imminently.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cIn recent weeks, you\u2019ve been working to deter Venezuelan drug traffickers, of which there are many. Of course, there aren\u2019t too many coming in by sea anymore,\u201d Trump told service members during a Thanksgiving call.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cYou probably noticed that people aren\u2019t wanting to be delivering by sea, and we\u2019ll be starting to stop them by land also,\u201d the president continued. \u201cThe land is easier, but that\u2019s going to start very soon.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham on Saturday applauded the president\u2019s suggestion that US land action in Venezuela would start soon.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cI very much appreciate and respect the determination by President Trump to deal with the drug caliphate countries that inhabit our backyard \u2014 chief among them Venezuela,\u201d the South Carolina Republican said in a statement provided to CNN.\n <\/p>\n \n The US military has amassed more than a dozen warships and 15,000 troops in the region as part of what the Pentagon has branded \u201cOperation Southern Spear.\u201d Dozens have been killed<\/a> in boat strikes as part of the anti-drug-trafficking campaign.\n <\/p>\n \n For his part, Maduro has sought to project strength and control. \u201cI ask you to remain unshakeable in your composure, ready and prepared to defend our right as a nation. We are a republic in arms!\u201d he said in a televised address to troops Thursday evening.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump aides, led largely by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, have continued to discuss a slew of military options against Maduro. Trump cut off all diplomatic talk with Venezuela in October, but he seemed to soften last week when he told reporters that Maduro \u201cwould like to talk\u201d and later suggested he would be open<\/a> to speaking with the Venezuelan leader \u201cat a certain time.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Maduro and his associates have reached out to the White House through a number of channels, and there are ongoing discussions about what communication between the two countries might look like, multiple administration officials said.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump and Maduro spoke by phone last week, according to The New York Times<\/a> and The Wall Street Journal<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n Earlier this week, Trump framed the change of heart as a matter of saving lives.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cIf he\u2019s the leader, if we can save lives, if we can do things the easy way, that\u2019s fine, and if we have to do it the hard way, that\u2019s fine, too,\u201d Trump told reporters when asked why he would engage directly with Maduro given the terrorist organization designation.\n <\/p>\n \n During earlier informal talks between the US and Venezuela, Maduro signaled an openness to eventually stepping down, though it would not be for at least 18 months, a source familiar with the discussions told CNN. While some US officials thought this might be a solution, the White House eventually concluded it would only support a plan that saw Maduro\u2019s immediate departure.\n <\/p>\n \n Meanwhile, Venezuelans are reacting to the growing isolation with a mix of resignation and apprehension.\n <\/p>\n \n For Venezuela, the recent geopolitical instability is not without precedent. Over the last 10 years, the nation has seen economic collapse, mass street protests, failed coups and countless conspiracies.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cWill they bomb? Will they not bomb? Who knows. \u2026 I don\u2019t really follow the news, and to be honest, nobody knows nothing,\u201d said Marilyn, a waitress at a cafe in Caracas, who asked to use only her first name for fear of retaliation from government officials.\n <\/p>\n \n Trump\u2019s threats of potential military action are yet to trigger<\/a> a tangible impact in the lives of millions of Venezuelans like Marilyn, but the government repression<\/a> remains palpable. At least 54 people were detained for expressing dissent in October alone, according to the human rights group PROVEA, some arrested simply for sharing anti-Maduro messages on WhatsApp.\n <\/p>\n \n The possibility of US strikes is on everyone\u2019s mind, but any mention of it is confined to the private sphere.\n <\/p>\n \n In public, life carries on as usual, with Christmas carols and Black Friday announcements blending with Maduro\u2019s almost daily appearances on television.\n <\/p>\n \n On Monday, Maduro said publicly that no matter what the United States does, \u201cthey will not be able to defeat Venezuela,\u201d claiming the South American county is \u201cinvincible.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n CNN\u2019s Stefano Pozzebon reported from Caracas, Venezuela.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Palm Beach, Florida \u00a0\u2014\u00a0 The United States continued its pressure campaign against Venezuela on Saturday as President Donald…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":321137,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-321136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}