A top Venezuelan official confirmed that President Nicolas Maduro sent a letter to President Donald Trump earlier this month offering talks to prevent a war.
The letter was published on Vice President Delcy Rodríguez’s Telegram account on Monday, and dated September 5. Maduro says in the letter that Trump has been led to believe “fake news” about Venezuela’s ties to drug trafficking and Caracas’ willingness to work with the Trump administration on returning Venezuelan migrants from the US.
The letter includes a map from a UN study that shows 87% of drugs from South America are trafficked to the Western US via the Pacific Ocean. Only seven percent of South American drugs make it into the US via the Caribbean.
The letter concludes with Maduro offering to engage in direct talks with Trump’s envoy Richard Grenell. In February, Grenell traveled to Venezuela and secured the release of six American prisoners after meeting with Maduro.
Following the meeting with Grenell, Secretary of State Marco Rubio began ramping up sanctions on Venezuela and seizing Maduro’s plane. In July, the State Department designated two Venezuelan cartels as narco-terrorist organizations. Trump has authorized military action against designated narco-terrorist organizations.
Trump and Rubio have claimed that Maduro is the leader of multiple narco-terrorist cartels and have offered a $50 million bounty on the Venezuelan President. The US intelligence community assessed that Maduro is not the leader of Tren de Aragua.
Washington also accuses Maduro of leading the Cartel de los Soles. However, a US-funded NGO has said there is little evidence that the Venezuelan government is the leader of the gang.
The letter from Maduro was sent to Trump in the days following a US strike on a ship in the Caribbean Sea that had left from Venezuela. The President claimed the attack killed 11 members of a narco-terrorist cartel that was attempting to bring drugs into the US. Trump has not offered evidence for the assertion.
The US has conducted two attacks on ships in the Caribbean after the letter was delivered to Trump.
In the post that included the letter, Rodríguez said, “The military threat against Venezuela, the Caribbean, and South America must cease, and the proclamation of a Zone of Peace must be respected.”
