U.S. Rep. Carlos Giménez (R-Fla.), the congressman for Florida’s twenty eighth Congressional District within the Home of Representatives, despatched a warning message to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Sept. 9.
“Maduro must leave before it’s too late. He still has time to hand the country over to its true and legitimate leaders,” Giménez wrote in a submit on X.
In a subsequent submit, Giménez, a member of the Home Armed Providers Committee, famous that the $50 million reward supplied by the U.S. authorities for the seize of Maduro “is still available.”
“Get it while it lasts,” he mentioned.
On July 29, 2024, the day after the elections, Venezuela’s Nationwide Electoral Council (CNE) formally declared Maduro the winner, permitting him to proceed as president of Venezuela for a 3rd time period, with out making the electoral information public.
Since then, Maduro’s political opposition has denied the outcomes issued by the CNE, claiming that the electoral information obtained by its witnesses present presidential candidate Edmundo González because the winner with 67 p.c of the vote.
The U.S.-based Carter Middle, accepted by the Maduro authorities to watch the elections, said in a report that it “cannot verify or corroborate the authenticity of the presidential election results declared by the CNE” as a result of it happened in “an environment of restricted freedoms to the detriment of political actors, civil society organizations, and the media.”
Different organizations, resembling Human Rights Watch, have reported a notable improve in arbitrary detentions, compelled disappearances, and different crimes in opposition to humanity by the Maduro-led Venezuelan authorities in opposition to opposition members and Venezuelan residents following the 2024 elections.
So far, almost 7 million Venezuelans have fled the nation since 2018, when Maduro turned president, in accordance to refugee and immigrant group R4V.
In latest weeks, america has deployed navy forces in Latin American and Caribbean waters to dam drug traffickers’ maritime routes, together with elevating the reward to $50 million for the arrest of Maduro, whom the U.S. authorities accuses of main the Cartel of the Suns, a narco-terrorist group primarily based in Venezuela.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, for his half, mentioned in a assertion in July that “Maduro is NOT the president of Venezuela, and his regime is NOT the legitimate government.”
“Maduro is the leader of the Cartel of the Suns, a narco-terrorist organization that has taken over a country. And he is accused of smuggling drugs into the United States,” the secretary of state added.
In response to those strikes, Maduro has denied the allegations and accused america of in search of regime change. On Sept. 1, he said that his nation was at “maximum readiness” and that, if attacked, he might constitutionally declare a “republic in arms.”
Venezuelan opposition chief María Corina Machado has mentioned that she and her workforce, which incorporates González, are prepared for an orderly and peaceable transition to democracy.
“We are going to take territorial and institutional control with the best Venezuelans; many are within the public administration, others in the private sector, and still others outside the country,” Machado mentioned in a submit on X on Sept. 3.
“We need honest, talented people willing to give their all to the transformation of Venezuela. All good Venezuelans will be needed to transform a ruined country into a true LAND OF GRACE,” she added.
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