Alwaght- Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said Friday US military and spy agency are plotting to assassinate him.
The Venezuelan president suggested the chief of US military’s Southern Command Craig Faller and CIA Director William Burns, who recently visited Colombia and Brazil, had come to finish "preparations" for a "violent plan" to assassinate him.
"Did Joe Biden ratify Donald Trump's orders to lead Venezuela into civil war and kill us? Yes or no? I ask," Maduro said during an address at a military ceremony.
"What did they do?” he further asked. “Our sources in Colombia assure us ... that they have come to prepare a plan to attack my life and that of important political and military leaders ... Did President Joe Biden authorize the plan to assassinate me and important political and military leaders in Venezuela? Yes or no?"
This is not the first time Maduro has made such an accusation. He made similar charges in 2019, when he insisted that the administration of former president Donald Trump had also arranged plans for his assassination in efforts to topple his administration.
“Donald Trump has without doubt given an order to kill me and has told the government of Colombia and the Colombian mafia to kill me,” Maduro said at the time.
Also in December 2020, Caracas reported yet another assassination plot against the Venezuelan president, saying that Maduro had unveiled there was an attempt against his life on the day of the parliamentary elections, which his ruling socialist party won by a landslide.
At the time, Maduro told reporters that he had to change his voting venue to the main military base in the capital Caracas after being informed of a plot to assassinate him, accusing the US-backed president of neighboring Colombia, Ivan Duque, of playing “a role in the plans to organize my assassination.”
"We received information from very reliable Colombian intelligence sources, that they were preparing an attack to assassinate me on election day," he said.
The development came nearly two weeks after Maduro declared that his country has once and for all gotten rid of the US oppression, warning that any efforts to interfere in the country’s internal affairs would not be tolerated.
In an interview on June 18 with Bloomberg Television, Maduro further downplayed US economic sanctions against his country, noting that his government has introduced a “war economy” to reduce the impact of US bans against the Central American nation.
“Sooner rather than later, the bolivar will once again occupy a strong and preponderant role in the economic and commercial life of the country,” he said.
He also dismissed claims by American officials that Caracas has become isolated in the world following its breaking away from the US influence, saying that his country has only broken free of “irrational, extremist, and cruel” US oppression.
Venezuela descended into political turmoil after the US-sponsored opposition figure and former president of the National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, unilaterally declared himself “interim president” in January 2019, arguing that Maduro's reelection in 2018 was fraudulent.
With Washington’s greenlight and help from a small number of rogue soldiers, Guaidó later launched a botched coup attempt against the elected government.
The Trump administration recognized Guaidó as the legitimate leader of Venezuela and publicly pursued a “regime change” policy against Maduro.
The Biden administration has reaffirmed US recognition of Guaido as Venezuela’s interim president and has ruled out negotiations with Maduro anytime soon.
Washington has imposed several rounds of crippling sanctions against the oil-rich Latin American country aimed at ousting Maduro and replacing him with Guaido.
The sanctions, which include illegal confiscation of Venezuelan assets abroad and an economic blockade, have caused enormous suffering for millions of people in the country.
