Venezuela's Maduro says US nationals among mercenary group arrested | Nicolas Maduro News

President Maduro said the group included mercenaries and hitmen, describing two U.S. detainees as very high-level.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro announced the arrest of a group of foreign mercenaries, including Colombian and American citizens, who he said were plotting to prevent his inauguration later this week.

Maduro said Tuesday the group was planning terrorist acts ahead of Friday's inauguration ceremony, describing them as two Colombian hitmen, three mercenaries from Ukraine's war and two U.S. citizens.

He said the Americans detained were very high-level, but he did not provide further details or evidence about the arrests.

Just today, we captured seven foreign mercenaries, including two important American mercenaries, he said in a broadcast on state television, before declaring a massive deployment of police and military across the country.

I am sure that in the next few hours they will confess, he added.

Maduro, who is expected to take office on Friday for a third term after disputed elections last July, said the group had been captured in unspecified parts of Venezuela.

In a speech from the presidential palace in Miraflores, he also said security forces had captured a total of 125 foreign mercenaries from 25 different countries. He said they entered the South American nation to practice terrorism against the Venezuelan people.

Neither the U.S. State Department nor Colombia's Foreign Ministry immediately responded to requests for comment.

Maduro, who first came to power in 2013, has frequently over the years made wild claims that the United States was plotting to remove him.

In late 2023, the Venezuelan government released dozens of prisoners, including 10 Americans, after months of negotiations between Caracas and Washington, while the United States released a close ally of Maduro, Colombian businessman Alex Saab .

The latest arrests came just hours after US President Joe Biden met with exiled Venezuelan opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, as well as after reports that Gonzalez Urrutia's son-in-law had been kidnapped in Caracas .

During the meeting, Biden said he supported a peaceful return to democratic rule in Venezuela and warned of further repression inside the country.

I had a long meeting with President Biden. His commitment to a peaceful and orderly transition in Venezuela is intact. For 45 minutes, we were able to delve deeper into the positive impact of the expansion of democracy from Venezuela for the region. pic.twitter.com/PuBS6vvgqL

Edmundo Gonzlez (@EdmundoGU) January 6, 2025

Translation: I had a long meeting with President Biden. His commitment to a peaceful and orderly transition in Venezuela remains intact. For 45 minutes, we were able to discuss in depth the positive impact that the expansion of democracy from Venezuela will have on the region. Thank you, President Biden!

Gonzalez Urrutia, who was declared president-elect by several governments in the region, including the United States, is touring friendly countries in a bid to increase his international support.

Washington and several of Venezuela's democratic neighbors believe the opposition leader won July's presidential election by a landslide and that the official results were falsified.

The opposition called on millions of Venezuelans to demonstrate on Thursday to prevent Maduro from retaining power and officially taking the oath of office.

They face an uphill battle.

Maduro, 62, and his political mentor Hugo Chavez, who died in 2013, governed Venezuela for the past quarter century.

Both have brushed aside waves of international and domestic pressure, retaining power through populist appeals, contested elections and the might of the army, police and paramilitary gangs.

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