United States President Donald Trump said on Saturday that the US would temporarily administer Venezuela following the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, describing the move as a transitional measure aimed at restoring stability.
Speaking during a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, Trump said the US would assume control of the country until conditions allow for what he described as a “safe, proper and judicious transition”.
“We’re going to run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition,” Trump said. “We don’t want to be involved with having someone else get in, and we have the same situation that we had for the last long period of years. So we are going to run the country.”
Trump did not provide a timeline for how long the transition period would last.
According to sources familiar with the operation, an elite unit of the Federal Bureau of Investigation assisted in the capture of Maduro. The FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team was embedded with the United States military as part of the special operation, a source told CNN.
The Hostage Rescue Team, commonly known as HRT, is a specialised FBI unit that operates in high-risk situations, including arrests, undercover missions and surveillance operations, according to the agency.
US officials have not released further details about the operation or Maduro’s current status.