MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Maduro's days in power “are numbered,” says Trump

“We have very secret plans” about Venezuela, Trump argued

US President Donald Trump suggested in a TV interview on Sunday that Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro's time in power is limited. However, he downplayed the likelihood of the United States' engaging in a war with the South American country. Asked whether the United States would go to war with Venezuela, Trump replied, “I doubt it. I don't think so.”

He insisted, though, that the Bolivarian regime has “treated us very badly” by allegedly sending “thousands of people from prisons, mental institutions, and drug addicts” across the US border and invoked military secrecy regarding his actual plans: “I'm not going to tell you what I'm going to do with Venezuela, whether I'm going to do it or not,” because “we have very secret plans.” Regarding the presence of the USS Gerald Ford aircraft carrier in the region, Trump replied that it “has to be somewhere, it's very big.”

In the meantime, US forces keep targeting alleged drug-carrying boats in the Caribbean and the nearby Pacific Ocean. Maduro has claimed that Washington was using these strikes as a pretext to “impose regime change” in Caracas and seize Venezuelan oil reserves. Some 65 people have been killed in these attacks.

Trump also admitted to the possible resumption of nuclear testing in over three decades. “I'm saying we're going to test nuclear weapons like other countries do, yes,” he stated. “I don't want to be the only country not testing.”