VLADIMIR Putin has vowed to support Nicolas Maduro after the US seized one of the Venezuelan tyrant’s oil tankers – pushing Washington and Caracas closer to all-out war.
The Russian despot now risks riling up Donald Trump as the US president continues to lose patience over ending the bloodshed in Ukraine – while also edging closer to regime change in Venezuela.
Putin is said to have pledged his “categorical” support for Maduro in a phone call with his fellow pariah on Thursday – just one day after the sophisticated tanker sting.
Mad Vlad “expressed solidarity with the Venezuelan people”, the Kremlin said.
The Russian dictator also promised to keep communications between Caracas and Moscow “permanently open”.
And he swore to back Venezuela “in its struggle to assert its sovereignty, international law, and peace throughout Latin America”.
SHADOW STRIKE
US ‘prepares to board more Venezuela oil tankers’ & sanctions 6 others
TANKER WARS
Moment US troops rappel from helicopters & storm tanker off Venezuela coast
The two cold-hearted leaders already have warm ties – most recently demonstrated by Maduro attending a military parade in Moscow earlier this year.
Following the Putin call, Colombia pledged to grant Maduro asylum should he be forced to leave the country, Bogotá confirmed on Thursday.
The chummy phone conversation came after rifle-wielding US troops rappelled from helicopters to raid an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela earlier this week.
Stunning footage showed commandos sweeping through the ship as they executed Donald Trump’s boldest play yet in his stand-off with Maduro.
The South American dictator hit back at the operation, raging: “Yesterday their mask fell, this was not about asylums, gangs, or drugs – it was about oil.
Blasting the interception, he said: “A civilian commercial vessel carrying 1.9 million barrels of Venezuelan oil to international markets was attacked, seized, and robbed in international waters near the Caribbean.
“The crew was kidnapped and remains missing – this act amounts to criminal naval piracy.”
The tanker was reportedly holding 1.1 million barrels of sanction-hit Venezuelan oil.
Forces from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, and the US Coast Guard all came together for the slick sting.
The US authorities are now preparing to intercept more ships transporting Venezuelan oil to increase pressure on Maduro, six sources told Reuters.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said: “We’re not going to stand by and watch sanctioned vessels sail the seas with black market oilthe proceeds of which will fuel narcoterrorism of rogue and illegitimate regimes around the world.”
One source said several more sanctioned tankers had been identified by the US for potential seizure.
Maduro slammed the US seizure, calling it an act of “naval piracy”.
It is a major escalation in the US campaign against Venezuela – and is the strongest hint yet that America’s sights are set beyond drug traffickers.
Washington accuses Venezuela’s regime, led by Maduro and his top aides, of flooding drugs inside the American territory.
Up to this point, operations had been limited to remote strikes on small boats that America identified as “narco-terrorists”.
As of December 4, at least 87 people had been killed in 22 strikes on 23 vessels.
Trump has justified the attacks as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the United States and asserted the US is engaged in an armed conflict with drug cartels.
He has repeatedly raised the possibility of military intervention in Venezuela, accusing it of sending narcotics to America.
It comes as Trump continues to make huge diplomatic efforts to end the bloodshed in Europe.
It was reported on Thursday that Ukrainians could be forced into a vote to decide whether to surrender land to Russia.
Russia has long demanded Ukraine hand over the whole of the Donbas region in exchange for peace – and that decision could now fall to the people through a referendum.
Diplomats from Ukraine, Europe, the US, and Russia have been embroiled in complex negotiations for months on end now.
Draft deals and counter-proposals have all proved fruitless so far despite the US president’s concerted efforts to stop the war in Ukraine once and for all.