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Venezuela calls Trump airspace closure warning ‘colonialist threat’
Venezuela has accused US President Donald Trump of making a “colonialist threat” after he said the airspace around the country should be considered closed.
The country’s foreign ministry called Trump’s comments “another extravagant, illegal and unjustified aggression against the Venezuelan people”.
The US does not legally have the authority to close another country’s airspace, but Trump’s online post could lead to travel uncertainty and deter airlines from operating there.
The US has been building its military presence in the Caribbean, which officials say is to combat drug smuggling. Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro has dismissed US claims of drug trafficking as an attempt to oust him.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote: “To all Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers, please consider THE AIRSPACE ABOVE AND SURROUNDING VENEZUELA TO BE CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY.”
The White House did not immediately respond to the BBC’s request for comment.
Trump’s comments come days after the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) warned airlines of “heightened military activity in and around Venezuela”.
In a statement on Saturday, Venezuela’s foreign ministry said that the US had “unilaterally suspended” its weekly migrant repatriation flights.
“We call directly on the international community, the sovereign governments of the world, the UN, and the relevant multilateral organizations to firmly reject this immoral act of aggression,” it said.
Venezuela on Wednesday banned six major international airlines – Iberia, TAP Portugal, Gol, Latam, Avianca and Turkish Airlines – from landing there after they failed to meet a 48-hour deadline to resume flights.
The US has deployed the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, and about 15,000 troops to within striking distance of Venezuela.
It has insisted that the deployment – the largest by the US in the region since it invaded Panama in 1989 – is to combat drug trafficking.
On Thursday, Trump warned that US efforts to halt Venezuelan drug trafficking “by land” would begin “very soon”.
US forces have carried out at least 21 strikes on boats they said were carrying drugs, killing more than 80 people. However, the US has not provided evidence that the boats carried drugs.
The Venezuelan government believes the aim of the US action is to depose Maduro, whose re-election last year was denounced by the Venezuelan opposition and many foreign nations as rigged.
The US has also designated Cartel de los Soles, or Cartel of the Suns – a group it alleges is headed by Maduro – as a foreign terrorist organisation.
Labelling an organisation as a terrorist group gives US law enforcement and military agencies broader powers to target and dismantle it.
Venezuela’s foreign ministry has “categorically, firmly, and absolutely rejected” the designation.
Venezuela’s interior and justice minister Diosdado Cabello, who is alleged to be one of the high-ranking members of the cartel, has long called it an “invention”.
The US state department has insisted that the Cartel de los Soles not only exists, but that it has “corrupted Venezuela’s military, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary”.
[BBC]
(Cricbuzz)
At least seven people have died and more than 80 others are missing after a landslide hit Indonesia’s West Java province, officials said.
The landslide occurred in the West Bandung region, south-east of the capital Jakarta, following days of intense rainfall.
More than thirty homes were destroyed after “landslide material buried residential areas, causing fatalities and affecting local residents”, Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency said in a statement.
Flooding, landslide and extreme weather alerts have also been issued for the broader region.
The landslide hit the village of Pasirlangu around 02:30AM on Saturday [24] (19:30 GMT).
Two dozen people were evacuated safely from the affected region, according to Abdul Muhari, communication chief of the National Search Agency.
Images shared by local news outlets showed homes buried under mud and debris.
[BBC]
Ukraine has condemned a fresh wave of Russian strikes overnight which killed one person and injured 23 others, as talks with the US aimed at ending the war are set to resume.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the “brutal” attack had “hit not only our people, but also the negotiation table”.
Delegations from Russia, Ukraine and the US have been meeting in Abu Dhabi for the first trilateral talks since the Kremlin launched a full-scale invasion of its neighbour in 2022.
A source told the BBC that some progress had been made but the key issue of territory remains unresolved.
The mayor of Ukrainian capital Kyiv said one person had died and four had been wounded while Kharkiv’s mayor reported that 19 people had been hurt during a sustained assault on the city in the early hours of Saturday morning.
On the second day of the three-way talks in Abu Dhabi, Sybiha said the “barbaric” overnight assault proved “that Putin’s place is not at the board of peace, but at the dock of the special tribunal”.
US President Donald Trump said last week that Russian leader Vladimir Putin had accepted an invitation to join his ‘Board of Peace’ – an organisation focused on ending global conflicts. Putin has not confirmed this.
Kyiv’s mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram that three of the four people who had been injured had been hospitalised.
He added that the capital’s critical infrastructure had been damaged, leaving 6,000 buildings without heating.
Temperatures in Ukraine are at sub-zero levels and in a statement following the assaults, President Volodymyr Zelensky said: “The main target of the Russians was the energy infrastructure.”
In Kharkiv, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said 19 people had been injured during the strikes in the early hours of Saturday morning. A maternity hospital and a hostel for displaced people were damaged.
Russia occupies roughly 20% of Ukraine, including parts of the eastern Donbas region. The Kremlin wants Ukraine to hand over large areas of the territory. Ukraine has ruled this out.
Following the first day of talks, Rustem Umerov, who is leading the Ukrainian delegation, said on social media: “The meeting focused on the parameters for ending Russia’s war and the further logic of the negotiation process aimed at advancing toward a dignified and lasting peace.”
[BBC]
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