A woman shouts slogans during a rally in support of ousted Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas. Venezuela's interim president Delcy Rodriguez insisted that no foreign power was governing her country, after US President Donald Trump said Washington would 'run' it pending a transition after ousting her predecessor. Photo / Ronaldo Schemidt, AFP
A woman shouts slogans during a rally in support of ousted Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas. Venezuela's interim president Delcy Rodriguez insisted that no foreign power was governing her country, after US President Donald Trump said Washington would 'run' it pending a transition after ousting her predecessor. Photo / Ronaldo Schemidt, AFP
Venezuela’s interim president Delcy Rodriguez insisted today that no foreign power was governing her country, after United States President Donald Trump said Washington would “run” it during a transition after ousting her predecessor.
Rodriguez, who was vice-president under toppled leader Nicolas Maduro, has given mixed signals about how much sheis prepared to co-operate with Trump, at times sounding conciliatory, at others defiant.
Speaking three days after US special forces snatched Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in a stunning raid in Caracas prefaced by airstrikes, Rodriguez said: “The government of Venezuela is in charge in our country, and no-one else.”
“There is no foreign agent governing Venezuela.”
Trump insists Washington is now “in charge” of the Caribbean country but says he is prepared to work with Rodriguez - provided she submits to his demand for access to Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
Rodriguez has offered an olive branch but also appeared anxious to keep on her side the hardliners who control the security forces and paramilitaries, which have patrolled the streets since Maduro’s capture.
“We are a people that does not surrender, we are a people that does not give up,” she declared, paying tribute to the “martyrs” of the US attacks.
In its first confirmation of losses, Venezuela’s military published a list of 23 troops, including five generals, killed in the US strikes.
Top ally Cuba separately issued a list of 32 dead Cuban military personnel, included two colonels and a lieutenant colonel, many of whom were members of Maduro’s security detail.
Venezuela has not yet confirmed the number of civilian casualties in the operation in which US forces grabbed Maduro and Flores and took them to the US to face trial.
Attorney-General Tarek William Saab spoke of “dozens” of civilian and military dead, without giving a breakdown.
‘Trump, murderer’
Thousands of supporters of the presidential couple, including powerful Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, marched through Caracas to demand their release.
Some carried figurines of Maduro’s “Super Moustache” super-hero alter ego or of Flores and wore red caps marked with Maduro’s slogan: “No war, yes peace”.
“Trump, murderer,” read the graffiti on one street kiosk.
Fear of state repression has made it so the unpopular Maduro’s many detractors loathe to celebrate his downfall.
Maduro and Flores appeared in court on Monday in New York, where they pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking and other charges.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has called on the United States to ensure they receive a fair trial.
Interim president’s challenges
Rodriguez has sought to project unity with Cabello and Defence Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, two hardliners seen as the main powerbrokers in the Maduro administration.
Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who has been sidelined by Washington in the post-Maduro transition, warned in a Fox News interview that Rodriguez was not to be trusted.
“Delcy Rodriguez as you know is one of the main architects of torture, persecution, corruption, narco-trafficking,” she said.
“She’s the main ally and liaison with Russia, China, Iran, certainly not an individual that could be trusted by international investors.”
In a sign that a repressive security apparatus remains in place, 16 journalists and media workers were detained in Venezuela, according to a journalists’ union. All were later released.
Trump has warned that Rodriguez will pay “a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro” if she does not comply with Washington’s agenda.
A retired general who held high-ranking positions in the military predicted that Rodriguez would throw open Venezuela to US oil and mining companies and perhaps resume diplomatic ties, broken off by Maduro in 2019.
He also believed she would seek to appease criticism of Venezuela’s dire rights record by releasing political prisoners.
Trump told Republican lawmakers today that Maduro was a “violent guy” who “killed millions of people” and claimed that Rodriguez’s administration was “closing up” a torture chamber in Caracas.
The constitution says that after Maduro is formally declared absent - which could happen after six months - elections must then be held within 30 days.
Machado told Fox News she was confident the opposition, widely seen as the real victors of 2024 elections in which Maduro claimed a third term, would win “over 90% of the votes.”
Bridge to escape
At a bridge leading to neighbouring Colombia, Venezuelans who live and work abroad exit their home country in a steady trickle.
They are full of anxiety for those they left behind after a festive season visit was blighted by the US military strike.
While many celebrate the toppling of Maduro, they are also anxious about what comes next.
Evelyn Cardenas, a 57-year-old Venezuelan architect who has lived in Chile for nine years, was among dozens gathered to cross on foot at the Simon Bolivar International Bridge, dragging a large suitcase on wheels and followed by her husband.
As soon as she crossed over into Colombia, she let out a sigh of relief.
“All Venezuelans are happy, but we can’t express it openly,” she told AFP. “I can say it now because I crossed the bridge.”
For many, the threat of further American intervention mixes with fear that the remaining “Chavista” administration will inflict retribution on anyone seen to be supporting Maduro’s ouster.
Cardenas, who is from the Venezuelan city of San Cristobal, had returned home to celebrate Christmas and the New Year with her family.
“We still can’t quite believe it,” said Cardenas, who plans to travel by bus and plane back to Santiago.
She was hopeful of “something positive” in the long term, and that Venezuela will finally “emerge from the darkness” of economic collapse and political repression.
In the meantime, she’d rather be somewhere else.
People attend a rally in support of Venezuela's ousted president Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas. Photo / Federico Parra, AFP
‘In shock’
Walter Monsalve, a 55-year-old teacher who works on both sides of the border that Colombia reinforced with soldiers and armoured vehicles, said he was “in shock”.
“It should never have happened like this, whatever the reason,” he said, likening the US attack to “someone barging into your house”.
Like him, many neighbours and family members were fearful of what will come next, said Monsalve.
“I don’t know what the UN is there for - there are these international bodies that don’t stop these situations,” he lamented.
Several Venezuelans, many of whom frequently cross into the town of Cucuta to shop at lower prices on the Colombian side of the border, declined to express an opinion out of fear.
One said only: “Things are weird over there” on the Venezuelan side.
Kayleig Jimenez, a 16-year-old student, said she hoped for the return of relatives and friends once things settle down.
“We are now Veneyork,” she laughed, in reference to Trump’s comments that the US “is going to run” her country.
Some eight million Venezuelans are estimated to have fled the South American nation in recent years, the majority of whom live in Colombia.
