CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan troops will remain stationed along the country’s borders to prevent territorial violations, the defense minister said on Tuesday, ahead of the opposition’s plan to bring in humanitarian aid to alleviate an economic crisis.

President Nicolas Maduro has rejected offers of foreign food and medicine, denying there are widespread shortages and accusing opposition leader Juan Guaido of using aid to undermine his government in a U.S.-orchestrated bid to oust him.

Guaido has said that aid will enter Venezuela from neighboring countries by land and sea on Saturday. The United States has sent tons of aid to Colombia’s border with Venezuela, but Maduro has refused to let it in.

In comments broadcast on state TV, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino said the opposition would have to pass over “our dead bodies” to impose a new government. Guaido, who has invoked the constitution to assume an interim presidency, denounces Maduro as illegitimate and has received backing from some 50 countries.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday warned members of Venezuela’s military who remain loyal to Maduro that they would “find no safe harbor, no easy exit and no way out.”

“You’ll lose everything,” Trump told a crowd of Venezuelan and Cuban immigrants in Miami.

Guaido has beseeched the armed forces to disavow Maduro, promising them future amnesty, though only a few high-ranking military officials have so far done so.

Padrino said it was unacceptable for the military to receive threats from Trump, and said officers and soldiers remained “obedient and subordinate” to Maduro.

“They will never accept orders from any foreign government ... they will remain deployed and alert along the borders, as our commander in chief has ordered, to avoid any violations of our territory’s integrity,” Padrino said.

“Those that attempt to be president here in Venezuela ... will have to pass over our dead bodies,” he said, referring to Guaido.

Maduro, who won a second term last year in an election that critics denounced as a sham, retains the backing of Russia and China and control of Venezuelan state institutions.</s>"We seek a peaceful transition of power, but all options are open," Trump declared, speaking at Florida International University in Miami on Monday. Directly addressing the Venezuelan soldiers who continue to back President Nicolas Maduro, he gave them the choice of accepting self-proclaimed 'interim president' Juan Guaido's "generous offer of amnesty," or facing "no safe harbor, no easy exit, and no way out."he cautioned. "I have a message for every official who is helping to keep Maduro in place. The eyes of the entire world are upon you today, every day and every day in the future."Trump proclaimed that "the days of socialism and communism are numbered," blaming "Maduro dictatorship" for all of Venezuela's woes. "Peace loving nations are willing to help Venezuela reclaim its democracy, its dignity and its destiny,"he said, to the cheers of the crowd.Trump boasted that the US had been the first of dozens of nations to recognize Guaido when the National Assembly leader unilaterally declared himself president, glossing over the world's split reaction to the regime change attempt.Faced with political uncertainty and dire socio-economic crisis, Venezuela remains under increased pressure from Washington, which has also been urging Caracas to allow international humanitarian aid into the country. Fearing a hidden motive behind the US intentions, Maduro ordered the military to come up with a plan to reinforce security along the border with Colombia., blaming Washington for deliberately exacerbating the crisis. He has declared the aid sitting at the Colombian border to be little more than "crumbs" and a publicity stunt, especially compared to billions of dollars the US had frozen in Venezuelan assets.As tensions rise, Maduro continues to call on the opposition to come to the table and negotiate. Yet Guaido seems to be sharing Washington's determination that the time for talks has "long passed" and apparently hopes that US-led support for the so-called democratic transition in the country will bring the opposition to power.</s>– For the beleaguered people of Venezuela, this Colombian border town has served for years as a kind of safety valve — a way station en route from their reeling homeland, or a place to score food, medicine and other basics no longer available in Venezuela.

"I came to get vaccinations for my daughter," said Almari Ruiz, cradling her 11-month-old, Victoria, as she moved forward with the throngs crossing the Simon Bolivar International Bridge on a recent afternoon. "It's hard to find them anymore in Venezuela."

Each day, authorities say, more than 30,000 pedestrians cross from Venezuela into Colombia; most are on subsistence shopping forays, but many are joining the exodus of millions who have given up on their homeland and emigrated elsewhere in recent years.

Now, however, as the Venezuelan crisis escalates, Cucuta has taken on a broader geopolitical role — as a symbolic and logistics hub for intensifying U.S. efforts to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his socialist government.

Diplomats, activists, journalists and others have descended on this tropical city of 800,000, which has long had a symbiotic relationship with neighboring Venezuela — the town's economic fate shifting with boom and bust cycles across the border.

"The whole world is now watching Cucuta," said Felix Adolfo Muñoz, who heads the mayor's crisis management team, which has been scrambling to deal with the onslaught and attention.

While the Trump administration has employed diplomatic pressure, economic sanctions and even hints of military action in its bid to force out Maduro, the weapon of choice in Cucuta, at least for now, is an unlikely one — humanitarian aid, lots of it. A showdown on blocked U.S. aid looms this weekend.

The White House has cast aside criticism that it is employing aid as a strategic cudgel to force the exit of Maduro, who has called the aid a prelude to a U.S. invasion and vowed it will never enter Venezuela. Instead, the Trump administration has doubled down on the tactic of using aid as a lever.

That venerable aid providers including the Red Cross and United Nations have declined to become involved — respecting the traditional separation between humanitarian aid and politics — has not dampened the Trump administration's enthusiasm for the gambit.

The White House calculation seems to be that the Venezuelan military — whose top brass has reaffirmed its allegiance to Maduro's government — will be somehow shamed into opening the border and defying its commander in chief. That would essentially signal a breakdown in military allegiance, and possibly the beginning of the end of Maduro's rule.

How likely that scenario is remains a question mark.

No one among dozens of Venezuelans interviewed in recent days seemed to object to the U.S. aid coming in. Venezuelans are fed up — and many blame Maduro, saying life was much better under his predecessor and mentor, the late Hugo Chávez, who funneled record oil revenue into reducing poverty and raising literacy levels.

"Yes of course, let the aid in," said Jose Abdon, 34, a Venezuelan who is among the many cart-men, or carrucheros, who work the crossing.

The carrucheros rent dollies or carts for a dollar a day and offer their services to shoppers returning to Venezuela with packages of goods.

Abdon says he earns the equivalent of about $4 a day. The money goes to support a wife and young daughter back in Venezuela.

"My daughter is 1 year and 1 month old," Abdon said, "and in her whole life we have only been able to buy one package of diapers. My wife has made to do with rags and cloths."</s>Gary Miller/Getty Images(LONDON) — In one of the strangest twists yet in the current crisis enveloping Venezuela, two rival concerts representing the divide in the international community will take place this weekend on the nation’s Colombian border — one staged by billionaire Richard Branson, the other by an increasingly defiant President Nicolas Maduro.

After philanthropist Branson, a critic of the Maduro regime, announced he was sponsoring a Live Aid-style benefit concert in the Colombian border city of Cucuta on Friday, Feb. 22, Maduro responded by announcing his administration would be hosting its own, two-day concert at the Simón Bolívar International Bridge on Feb. 22 and 23.

Both are set to take place this weekend on the border that is serving as the current flashpoint in the ongoing political crisis in Venezuela.

The opposition leader, Juan Guaido — who has been recognized by the United States as interim president of the country — has denounced Maduro’s refusal to let humanitarian aid enter the country. Maduro, who crucially holds the backing of the military, has consistently said that the aid his government has blocked from entering the country is part of an imperialist plot to bring about regime change.

Branson announced the benefit concert on Feb. 15, saying in a statement that the “humanitarian crisis in Venezuela worsens every day.” “Nicolas Maduro’s regime still refuses to accept any humanitarian aid destined for the country’s suffering people,” he added. Around 300,000 people are expected to attend the benefit concert, according to The Guardian.

Branson said all the money raised by the aid concert will be distributed to humanitarian aid organizations.

In response, Venezuela’s vice president of communication, tourism and culture, Jorge Rodríguez, announced at a press conference on Monday that the “a large number of Venezuelan artists” had proposed a “great concert for peace.” The lineup of artists for the Venezuelan government’s concert is yet to be confirmed.

The musician Roger Waters, the former bassist and singer of rock band Pink Floyd, has criticized Branson’s aid concert as being politically motivated.

“It has nothing to do with humanitarian aid at all,” Waters said in a video posted on twitter. “It has to do with Richard Branson… having bought the U.S. saying, ‘We have decided to take over Venezuela.’”

“There is, so far, no civil war, no mayhem, no murderer, no apparent dictatorship,” he added.

Branson has said there is no government involvement in the aid concert and it is purely a humanitarian exercise.

“Richard is helping them to raise awareness of the crisis in Venezuela and raise much-needed funds through this event,” a spokesperson for Virgin, which handles media inquiries for Branson, said in a statement. “This is not a political statement and the U.S. is not involved in any aspect of this.”</s>Caracas: Venezuela’s military said on Tuesday it was on alert at its frontiers following threats by US President Donald Trump and suspended air and sea links with the island of Curacao ahead of a planned aid shipment.

 Opposition leader and self-declared interim president Juan Guaido has vowed to bring aid in from various points on Saturday “one way or another” despite military efforts to block it. But commanders doubled down on their allegiance to President Nicolas Maduro after Trump urged them to abandon him.

 “The armed forces will remain deployed and on alert along the borders… to avoid any violations of territorial integrity,” said Defence Minister Vladimir Padrino.

 Regional commander Vladimir Quintero later confirmed media reports that Venezuela had ordered the suspension of air and sea links

 with Curacao and the nearby Netherlands Antilles islands of Aruba and Bonaire.

 Shipments of food and medicine for Venezuelans suffering in the country’s economic crisis have become a focus of the power struggle between Maduro and Guaido.

 Aid is being stored in Colombia near the Venezuelan border and Guaido aims also to bring in consignments via Brazil and Curacao, which is off the coast of Venezuela.

 A Brazilian presidential spokesman said the country was cooperating with the United States to supply aid to Venezuela but would leave it to Venezuelans to take the goods over the border.

 Maduro says the aid plan is a smokescreen for a US invasion. He blames US sanctions and “economic war” for Venezuela’s crisis.

 Guaido, the 35-year-old leader of the Venezuelan legislature, has appealed to military leaders to switch allegiance to him and let the aid through. He has offered military commanders an amnesty if they abandon Maduro. — AFP</s>On 19 February, the Latin American country’s regional military chief announced the closure of the Venezuelan maritime border with the Dutch Caribbean.

Venezuela will close the border with neighboring island nations, suspend air traffic and revise their diplomatic ties, its Vice President Delcy Rodriguez said Wednesday after the Caribbean island of Curacao agreed to act as a hub for relief aid shipments.

“Venezuela has decided not only to shut the border but also to revise relations with these countries. These measures will be in place until their governments start following and respecting international laws,” she said at a press conference broadcast by the state television.

Earlier in the day, the Reuters news agency reports, citing a regional military commander that Venezuela’s government had reopened its national maritime border with the Dutch Antilles islands following its closure on Tuesday.

This comes after Venezuela’s regional military chief said on Tuesday that he had ordered the closure of the Venezuelan maritime border with the Dutch Antilles islands. The move was made amid Dutch plans to open a logistical hub for humanitarian aid on the island of Curacao, however, the exact reasons behind Caracas’ decision to close the border remain unclear.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro refused to accept US aid that is currently waiting in Colombia, blasting it as a ploy to topple his government.

Venezuela is in the midst of a political crisis, which escalated in late January when Venezuelan opposition parliamentary speaker Juan Guaido declared himself interim president, disputing last year’s re-election of Maduro.

Guaido was recognized by the United States and a number of other countries. At the same time, Russia, China, Mexico, Turkey and Uruguay were among those that voiced their support for Maduro as the country’s legitimately elected president.</s>Members of Venezuela’s opposition are gathering in Cúcuta, Colombia, where they are frantically planning to shift stockpiled US aid to their homeland this weekend, in defiance of their country’s embattled president Nicolás Maduro.



“Saturday will be a day that goes down in our history,” said Omar Lares, the former mayor of Campo Elías in western Venezuela, who has been living in exile in the border city for two years and is now helping coordinate Saturday’s planned delivery of aid.

“We’re working overtime to get the food and medicine that people so desperately need,” Lares said, speaking in the lobby of the Casino Internacional hotel, which has become one of the opposition’s impromptu bases of operations over the last month.

Juan Guaidó, the opposition leader who has been recognised by the US and dozens more countries as Venezuela’s legitimate interim president, set a deadline of Saturday for the aid to move across the border, though representatives in Cúcuta, Caracas and Washington are yet to decide how the aid will cross.

Guaidó called for caravans of volunteers to carry the aid across at a speech before thousands of supporters in Caracas last week, though it would pit those civilians against the military – loyal to Maduro – which is under orders to block the aid.

For now, the shipments of aid sit in a warehouse next to the Tienditas bridge, connecting the two countries, which was finished in 2016 but never inaugurated. Although thousands cross the nearby Simón Bolívar bridge on foot every day, the border has been closed to most vehicles since 2015 following a string of disputes between the two countries.

In advance of the first shipment of aid to the border, Maduro had the Tienditas bridge blockaded with containers and an oil tank. The bridge had long been lightly barricaded with a wire fence, aimed at keeping out contraband smugglers.

While in part a bid to get much-needed food and medicine to Venezuela’s suffering population, Saturday’s aid mission is also, Guaidó and the Trump administration have said, intended to weaken Maduro by forcing the military to disobey their boss and allow the aid on to Venezuelan soil, which could play into Maduro’s narrative that the US is seeking to invade.

“You will find no safe harbour, no easy exit and no way out. You will lose everything,” Donald Trump said in a speech in at Florida International University in Miami on Monday before large American and Venezuelan flags. “We seek a peaceful transition of power, but all options are open.”

Many humanitarian groups have distanced themselves from the aid operation, given its overtly political nature. “Humanitarian action needs to be independent of political, military or any other objectives,” UN spokesman Stéphane Dujarric told reporters in New York last week.

The move comes against the backdrop of a propaganda war between Guaidó and Maduro, with rival concerts set up in support of each president’s stance over the aid.

Richard Branson, the billionaire founder of the Virgin Group, threw his clout and cash behind Guaidó’s efforts earlier this month when he announced a concert in Cúcuta to raise funds to relieve Venezuela’s humanitarian crisis, and to pressure Maduro to open up his country’s borders. That concert, which will take place on Friday, is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of attendees.

“Venezuela sadly has not become the utopia that the current administration of Venezuela or the past administration were hoping for, and that has resulted in a lot of people literally dying from lack of medical help,” Branson told the Associated Press in a telephone interview from Necker, his private island in the British Virgin Islands, on Monday. “I think it will draw attention to the problem on a global basis.”

Maduro’s rival concert will take place on Saturday and Sunday, over the border from the one in Colombia organised by Branson, Venezuela’s information minister Jorge Rodríguez announced on Monday. In an apparent retort to the US aid project, Rodríguez announced that 20,000 boxes of food aid would be sent to Cúcuta.

Guaidó lambasted the move by Maduro’s government to put on a rival concert, calling it “desperate”.

“They’re debating whether the aid should come in or not ... They don’t know what to do,” Guaidó said on Monday. “They’re now making up a concert. How many concerts are they going to stage?”

Since 2015, some three million Venezuelans have fled spiralling hyperinflation and widespread shortages of food and medicine, with almost 1.5 million staying in Colombia, according to UNHCR. Many refugees and migrants cross at the Simón Bolívar bridge, the busiest of Colombia’s border crossings, just outside Cúcuta.

“Maduro says that Venezuela shouldn’t be begging for food,” said Rosa Álvarez, a Venezuelan migrant from Maracay who was queueing for a meal at a soup kitchen near the bridge. “But look at what we are having to do right now.”

A friend of hers quickly joined in.

“People are dying in our country,” said Misleidy Castaño, from Valencia in northern Venezuela. “I’m not interested in going to any concert, but it if it helps get aid into Venezuela, it can only be a good thing.”</s>CARACAS, Feb 21 (Reuters) - Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido plans to head to the Colombian border in a convoy of vehicles on Thursday to receive humanitarian aid for his crisis-stricken nation, despite the objection of increasingly isolated President Nicolas Maduro.

Guaido, recognized by dozens of countries as Venezuela's legitimate head of state, said the opposition plans to bring in aid by land and sea on Saturday to alleviate severe and widespread shortages of food and medicine after years of hyperinflation.

He will undertake the 800-kilometer (497-mile) road trip from Caracas in the company of some 80 lawmakers from the opposition-controlled congress, which he leads, opposition legislators said.

Guaido invoked the constitution to assume an interim presidency on Jan. 23.

"Through this call for humanitarian aid, the population will benefit from the arrival of these goods to the Venezuelan border," said opposition legislator Edgar Zambrano, as he waited in a plaza of eastern Caracas with other lawmakers to board buses.

Maduro's socialist government denies there is an economic crisis and has said soldiers would remain stationed along the country's borders to prevent potential incursions.

He accuses the Trump administration, which recognizes Guaido and is supporting the relief effort but has levied crippling sanctions against his government, of seeking to force his ouster.

It is unclear how Guaido plans to bring in the aid. Opposition figures have suggested forming human chains across the Colombian border to pass aid packages from person to person and fleets of boats arriving from the Dutch Caribbean islands.

The United States has sent tons of aid to Colombia's border with Venezuela, which Maduro has mocked as a "cheap show." Maduro's vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, has alleged the aid is poisonous and could lead to cancer.

On Wednesday, Maduro's socialist administration said it had closed the country's maritime border with the Dutch Caribbean islands of Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire, after Curacao's government said it would help store aid destined for Venezuela.

Colombia expelled five Venezuelans from Cucuta for "carrying forward activities which attack citizen security and social order," its migration agency said in a statement late on Wednesday.

"We know there is interest by the Maduro dictatorship in affecting national security because of coming events," agency directors Christian Kruger added in the statement. (Reporting by Angus Berwick' additional reporting by Julia Symmes Cobb in Bogota; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Bill Trott)</s>Caracas — Venezuela’s military said on Tuesday it was on alert at its frontiers following threats by US President Donald Trump and suspended air and sea links with the island of Curaçao ahead of a planned aid shipment.

Opposition leader and self-declared interim president Juan Guaidó has vowed to bring aid in from various points on Saturday “one way or another”, despite military efforts to block it.

But commanders doubled down on their allegiance to President Nicolás Maduro after Trump urged them to abandon him.

“The armed forces will remain deployed and on alert along the borders ... to avoid any violations of territorial integrity,” said defence minister Vladimir Padrino.

Regional commander Vladimir Quintero later confirmed media reports that Venezuela has ordered the suspension of air and sea links with Curaçao and the nearby Netherlands Antilles islands of Aruba and Bonaire.

Shipments of food and medicine for Venezuelans suffering in the country’s economic crisis have become a focus of the power struggle between Maduro and Guaidó. Aid is being stored in Colombia near the Venezuelan border and Guaidó aims also to bring in consignments via Brazil and Curaçao, which is off the coast of Venezuela.

A Brazilian presidential spokesperson said the country is co-operating with the US to supply aid to Venezuela but would leave it to Venezuelans to take the goods over the border. Maduro says the aid plan is a smokescreen for a US invasion. He blames US sanctions and “economic war” for Venezuela’s crisis.

Guaidó has appealed to military leaders to switch allegiance to him and let the aid through. He has offered military commanders an amnesty if they abandon Maduro. But the military high command has so far maintained its public backing for Maduro — seen as key to keeping him in power.

“We reiterate unrestrictedly our obedience, subordination and loyalty” to Maduro, Padrino said.</s>The White House warned the Venezuelan military that any violence committed against civilians at its borders with Brazil and Colombia where aid waits to be brought into the country "will not be forgotten."

On Tuesday, the Brazilian government offered humanitarian aid to the country at the request of Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, the Guardian reported.

The aid, which is to be delivered by Feb. 23, is to be brought over the border from the northern Brazilian city of Boa Vista in Venezuelan trucks driven by Venezuelan nationals.

The announcement comes as U.S. aid is being readied to be shipped over into Venezuela from the northwestern Colombian border town of Cucuta, though it is not yet known how this aid will cross into the country.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has protested the need for aid and he has claimed that this entire situation stems from U.S. efforts at organizing a coup.

To prevent the U.S. aid from entering, Madura has blockaded a major bridge between Colombia and Venezuela with containers and an oil tanker truck.

Guaido had called for volunteers to help deliver the aid and he said some 600,000 have responded to transport the aid on Saturday.

The announcement of aid comes as the Venezuelan military has vowed to support Maduro, who since having his position stripped in late March has seen international recognition dissipate.

Since Guaido gained control of the control in mid-January, dozens of countries have backed his presidency, further denying Maduro's claim to the helm of the South American nation.

National security advisor John Bolton said in a tweet Tuesday that the Venezuelan military must uphold its duty to protect citizens at its borders and allow aid to be brought into the country.

"Any actions by the Venezuelan military to condone or instigate violence against peaceful civilians at the Colombian and Brazilian borders will not be forgotten. Leaders still have time to make the right choice."

On Monday, U.S. President Donald Trump warned Maduro and his supporters during a speech in Miami, Florida, that the entire world was watching them.

"We seek a peaceful transition of power, but all options are open," he said. "You will lose everything. Let your people go, set your country free."

This article has been adapted from its original source.
The Venezuelan Navy closes its maritime borders with the Dutch Caribbean islands of Aruba, Curaçao and Bonaire ahead of the planned entry of international humanitarian aid into Venezuela on February 23, which Nicolás Maduro considers a precursor to invasion.