WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump spoke with Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro last week and discussed a possible meeting between them in the United States, the New York Times reported on Friday, citing multiple people with knowledge of the matter. The newspaper added that there were no plans at the moment for such a meeting, which […]
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Trump, Maduro spoke last week, New York Times reports
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump spoke with Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro last week and discussed a possible meeting between them in the United States, the New York Times reported on Friday, citing multiple people with knowledge of the matter.
The newspaper added that there were no plans at the moment for such a meeting, which – if it occurred – would be the first-ever encounter between the authoritarian Venezuelan leader and a U.S. president.
The revelation of the phone call comes as Trump continues to use bellicose rhetoric toward Venezuela, while also entertaining the possibility of diplomacy.
The Trump administration has described Maduro as an illegitimate leader, who leads a drug trafficking organization known as Cartel de los Soles, an allegation Caracas denies.
Since early September, the U.S. government has been bombing alleged drug boats originating in Venezuela and other Latin American nations, a practice that Democrats, scholars and human rights experts have described as extrajudicial executions.
On Thursday, Trump repeated his previous threats to begin bombing land-based targets.
“The land is easier, but that’s going to start very soon,” Trump told reporters.
Neither the White House nor the Venezuelan communications ministry, which handles all press requests for the government, immediately responded to requests for comments.
(Reporting by Jasper Ward, Gram Slattery, Jeff Mason and Julia Symmes Cobb; editing by Diane Craft)