Richard Grenelll, the man for special missions, met this Friday in Caracas with President Nicolás Maduro. The main objective of the meeting was to ensure that Venezuela accepts the return of deported Venezuelans from the United States, and releases Americans retained in the Latin American country. “You must receive Venezuelan criminals who have been sent to the United States.” This warning, which is “unnegotiable,” was launched by the white house for Latin America, Mauricio Claver-Carone, during a wheel with journalists in Washington hours before the start of the Grenell mission. Maduro offered Trump’s envoy a “zero agenda” for the restart of conversations; That is, put new agreements on the table.
“The need to turn relations was ratified,” the Venezuelan government reported at the end of the meeting. And he gave clues of what Maduro considers the “zero agenda”: “Migration, negative impact of economic sanctions, American citizens involved crimes in the Venezuelan territory and integrity of the Venezuelan political system.”
Trump gave special relevance to the mission of his envoy and referred to her during statements in the Oval Hall. “We want to do something with Venezuela. I have been a great adversary of Venezuela and Maduro, ”he said. “They have not treated us very well, but more importantly, they have treated the Venezuelan people very bad.” During his stay in Caracas, the special American envoy Grenelll plans to meet “with many different people, but we support the people of Venezuela,” Trump said. The president answered a question about whether the meeting of his representative with Maduro legitimized the Chavista regime, after his government has referred to the opposition leader Edmundo González as the president “by right” of Venezuela.
Trump has also assured that he will not allow the purchase of oil from Venezuela, as his predecessor, Joe Biden, did when he raised a series of sanctions before last year’s presidential elections in the Andean country. “Biden was and bought millions of barrels of oil. I will not consent to spend a nonsense again, ”he said.
Maduro and Grenelll was the first high -level meeting between the United States and Venezuela after. The results of the appointment will mark the course of the relationship between the two countries, after years of tensions and the imposition of sanctions and support for the Venezuelan opposition by Washington. The most urgent interest of the White House is to coordinate the deportation flights of Venezuelans, the most visible part of its aggressive anti -immigrant policy. In the case of Venezuela, the list includes the leaders of the criminal group of Aragua captured in the United States. Maduro has already said that he is willing to receive them. “We do want them to come back. If they don’t want them there, we want them, with love, and we open our arms, ”he said this week.
For, the priority is the lifting of the economic and individual sanctions imposed on a hundred officials from the White House, which offers millionaire rewards for the capture of Maduro and senior officials of the regime.
Trump’s agenda does not include a negotiation, Claver-Carone clarified. And it adds to the deportation of Venezuelans, the release of at least six Americans arrested for Caracas under positions of conspiracy. “American hostages in Venezuela have to be released and returned immediately,” he said. If the government of President Maduro does not meet those demands, the new US president has already stressed that “there will be consequences.” Claver-Carone recommended Maduro to take advantage of “this opportunity.”
after Trump recognized Juan Guaidó as president of Venezuela during his first term. During the administration of Joe Biden, Chavismo regained dialogue with the United States, after crossing the hardest siege of sanctions imposed by Trump in his first mandate. Biden of interest to the government, such as the nephews of the First Lady, Cilia Flores. The most resonant case was pointed out to be a testaferro of senior Chavista officials. Saab is today a member of the Maduro Cabinet.
Biden also began secret conversations with Caracas in Doha, which led to the Barbados agreement, signed with the Venezuelan opposition in 2023 to agree on conditions for free elections that were not finally met. The opposition denounces with the official copies of the voting acts that have won those presidential elections, held on July 28 of last year. Maduro did not demonstrate his triumph with the minutes and began a third term in early January. Much of the international community does not recognize it as president, including the United States government.
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