{"id":9486,"date":"2025-08-27T05:38:43","date_gmt":"2025-08-27T09:38:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=9486"},"modified":"2025-08-28T05:40:23","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T09:40:23","slug":"venezuela-will-deploy-military-vessels-to-caribbean-and-other-waters-to-combat-drug-trafficking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=9486","title":{"rendered":"Venezuela Will Deploy Military Vessels to Caribbean and Other Waters to Combat Drug Trafficking"},"content":{"rendered":"
Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez waves as he arrives to a press conference by President Nicolas Maduro at Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas, Venezuela, Jan. 25, 2019. (AP Photo\/Ariana Cubillos, File)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Venezuela<\/a><\/span> will send military vessels to the Caribbean Sea and other waters to combat drug trafficking, the country\u2019s defense minister announced Tuesday. The move comes as tensions with the U.S. simmer over the deployment of three warships to the region.<\/p>\n

Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino L\u00f3pez said the vessels will patrol the Gulf of Venezuela as well as the country\u2019s \u201cterritorial waters\u201d in the Caribbean. In an Instagram reel, Padrino added that about 15,000 members of the armed forces will participate in efforts on land and at sea to fight \u201c the armed, terrorist, drug-trafficking groups<\/a><\/span> operating on the border\u201d with Colombia.<\/p>\n

Padrino announced the operation more than a week after the U.S. government announced the deployment of three guided-missile destroyers to the waters off Venezuela to combat threats from Latin American drug cartels<\/a><\/span>. Venezuela\u2019s initial response to the deployment was to call on Venezuelans to enlist in a volunteer militia meant to assist the armed forces in the defense of external and domestic attacks.<\/p>\n

The move to deploy U.S. destroyers and personnel comes as U.S. President Donald Trump<\/a><\/span> pushes for using the military to thwart cartels he blames for the flow of fentanyl and other illicit drugs into American communities and for perpetuating violence in some U.S. cities.<\/p>\n

On Monday, Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a><\/span> insisted during a weekly television show that his country, unlike neighboring Colombia, is \u201cfree of coca leaf crops and free of cocaine production.\u201d He also criticized the U.S. government for not addressing the drug consumption within its borders.<\/p>\n

In a separate announcement Tuesday, Padrino said an ongoing operation in Venezuela\u2019s northeastern corner had resulted in the dismantling of shipyards where criminals intended \u201cto manufacture semisubmersibles and boats to transport drugs by sea\u201d to markets in Europe and North America.<\/p>\n

– AP News<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Venezuela will send military vessels to the Caribbean Sea and other waters to combat drug trafficking, the country\u2019s defense minister announced Tuesday. The move comes as tensions with the U.S. simmer over the deployment of three warships to the region. Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino L\u00f3pez said the vessels will patrol the Gulf of Venezuela as well…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":9488,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dims.apnews.com\/dims4\/default\/3e1c4c0\/2147483647\/strip\/true\/crop\/5228x3484+0+9\/resize\/980x653!\/format\/webp\/quality\/90\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.apnews.com%2F60%2F61%2F40bb10761869fca3bbf9d6c1af79%2F46daeb078785416a803a0ec5bdac7f36","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-security-public-safety"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9486"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9489,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9486\/revisions\/9489"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}