Trump Declares U.S. May Launch Second Strike if Venezuela Does Not Comply

U.S. President Donald Trump has indicated that Washington has not dismissed the option of carrying out a second military strike in Venezuela, stressing that any further action would hinge on the behaviour of the Latin American nation following the arrest of President Nicolás Maduro.

“If they don’t behave, we will do a second strike,” Trump told PulseNets aboard Marine One while en route from Mar-a-Lago to the White House, according to a report obtained by the news outlet.

Special U.S. forces successfully apprehended Mr Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, on Saturday, and transported them to New York to face federal charges that include drug trafficking. PulseNets learnt that the operation was executed with high precision and has been officially codenamed ‘Operation Armour Shield’.

Trump described Maduro as a “dictator and leader of a drug cartel” responsible for trafficking cocaine into the United States. He further told PulseNets that Maduro would be arraigned on Monday before a federal court in Manhattan.

The U.S. leader also asserted that his administration would “run” Venezuela and take control of the country’s oil industry, a move that interim President Delcy Rodríguez openly resisted. In a statement to PulseNets, Rodríguez said, “Venezuelans will defend our natural resources at all costs.”

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The extraction of the Maduros has sparked a global debate, PulseNets learnt. While several countries welcomed Maduro’s capture as a long-overdue measure, nations including Russia and Ghana insisted that Venezuelans themselves should determine their political leadership without external interference.