US President Donald Trump says efforts to stem alleged Venezuelan drug trafficking “overland” would begin “very soon” amid rising tensions with the South American country.
Trump has sent a large deployment of US military personnel to the region, including a group of aircraft carriers, with the mission of tackling cross-border crime and drug trafficking.
But Venezuela claims it is actually a ploy to overthrow left-wing President Nicolas Maduro, whom the United States considers an illegitimate leader and a drug lord – a charge he denies.
“We’re almost stopped — it’s about 85 percent stopped by sea,” Trump said in a Thanksgiving video call with U.S. troops from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
‘And we will also stop them by land. The country is easier, but that will start very soon.’
Several of the US military groups Trump addressed actively participated in his anti-drug operation, dubbed ‘Southern Spear’.
As part of the operation, the US military has so far only announced it will target suspected drug traffickers in international waters, killing at least 83 people, according to a review of publicly released figures from Agence France-Presse.
The United States has released no details to support its claim that the people targeted in both the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific in the more than two dozen attacks were actually human traffickers.
The strikes have raised legal concerns about the lack of judicial review.
Maduro and his government have always denied any involvement in the crime and have accused the US of seeking regime change out of a desire to gain control of Venezuela’s natural resources, especially its vast oil reserves.
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