Donald Trump has revealed new details of the operation to capture Nicolas Maduro which saw “many” killed, as supporters of the deposed Venezuelan president took to the streets.
Describing the military operation as “brilliant tactically” and “complex”, the US president said “a lot of people were killed” but they were “mostly Cubans”.
He clarified that no US military personal were among the dead and the fatalities were “on the other side”.
Venezuela’s military said on Saturday that at least 24 Venezuelan security officers were killed in the US operation. Cuba’s government had said on Sunday that 32 Cuban military and police officers working in Venezuela had died in the operation.
Associated Press reported that its analysis had found that more civilians were killed in the strikes, but it was not immediately clear how many.
“We had a lot of boots on the ground, but it was amazing. And think of it, nobody was killed,” Mr Trump said in an address to the Kennedy Centre on Tuesday.
“And on the other side, a lot of people were killed. Unfortunately, I say that, soldiers, Cubans, mostly Cubans, but many, many killed.”
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Mr Trump said soldiers on the ground in Venezuela were “protected and our guys weren’t”, adding that electricity to “almost the entire country” was cut off during the operation that involved 152 aircraft.
He also criticised US Democrats for failing to congratulate him on the seizure of Maduro, who he described as a “bad guy”.
“He gets up there and he tries to imitate my dance a little bit… But he’s a violent guy, and he’s killed millions of people,” he said.
His remarks come as footage emerged of Venezuela’s interior minister Diosdado Cabello and a group of armed men shouting their support for Maduro.
“Loyal forever, traitors never, doubting is treason,” they chanted.
Venezuela’s attorney-general Tarek Saab said “dozens” of officials and civilians were killed, without specifying if he was talking about Venezuelans, and a team of three prosecutors would investigate the deaths.
Mr Saab also criticised the US’s seizure of Maduro to put him on trial for drugs and weapons charges in New York, arguing that America had no jurisdiction.
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US House speaker Mike Johnson said he did not expect the US to deploy troops on the ground in Venezuela.
The American military action was “not a regime change” operation, he told reporters.
His comments came after US secretary of state Marco Rubio and other top officials briefed leaders in the US Congress on the operation in Venezuela on Monday.
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The briefing was met with criticism from Democrats, with Senator Chuck Schumer saying the session “posed far more questions than it answered”.
Meanwhile, the US is believed to be planning to intercept a sanctioned tanker that has been used to carry Venezuelan crude oil, CBS News reported.
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The US would prefer to capture the ship rather than sink it, sources told the American broadcaster, in a move reminiscent of the military’s seizure of another crude oil tanker in December.
US forces have been pursuing the tanker – called the Marinera after its name was changed from Bella 1 – as part of its campaign of sanctions and military operations against Venezuelan tankers in the Caribbean.
Ships like the Marinera are part of a so-called shadow fleet of ships that illegally transport oil between sanctioned nations like Russia, Iran and Venezuela.
