'WE’LL RUN VENEZUELA' - Trump seizes globe’s largest oil reserves as world leaders slam 'illegal attack'

UNITED STATES president Donald Trump confirmed that they have completed an operation that captured Venezuelan counterpart Nicolás Maduro and his wife.

Maduro has been jailed in New York City and faces federal charges related to drug trafficking and working with gangs designated as terrorist organisations, which Maduro denies. 

US Attorney General Pam Bondi shared a superseding indictment similar to one filed against Maduro in 2020 - including that he is responsible for sending cocaine and fentanyl into the US.

Hours after explosions rocked the Venezuelan capital Caracas on Friday night, Trump told reporters at his Mar‑a‑Lago estate that Washington would “run” Venezuela until a “safe, proper and judicious” transition could take place.

Trump said: “We’re going to run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition.”

However, Venezuelan authorities called the attack, carried out by the US Army’s elite Delta Force, an “imperialist assault”, declared a state of emergency, and urged citizens to take to the streets to defend their nation.

Governments around the world responded one after the other, including strong condemnation from Pretoria.

SA formally condemned the attack, saying it was a grave violation of international law and a clear breach of the United Nations Charter.

DIRCO said in a statement: “SA views these actions as a manifest violation of the Charter of the United Nations, which mandates that all Member States refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.”

In recent weeks, the US has seized two Venezuelan oil tankers, with many critics saying that Trump and the US are only after the South American nations huge oil reserves - with an estimated 300 billion barrels making it the largest in the world. 

Venezuelan officials said: “The objective of this attack is none other than to seize Venezuela's strategic resources, particularly its oil and minerals, in an attempt to forcibly break the nation's political independence. They will not succeed.”

Trump didn’t deny that he is eyeing the oil. 

He added: “We’re going to have our very large US oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country and we are ready to stage a second and much larger attack if we need to do so.

“So we were prepared to do a second wave.”