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Maria Corina Machado gave Trump her Nobel Peace Prize after the US leader captured Nicolas Maduro.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n By <\/span>Al Jazeera staff, AFP and Reuters<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Published On 18 Apr 2026<\/span>18 Apr 2026<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Venezuela\u2019s main opposition leader Maria Corina Machado says she has \u201cno regrets\u201d about giving US President Donald Trump her Nobel Peace Prize medal.<\/p>\n Machado, the 2025 recipient of the prestigious prize, presented the medal that accompanies the prize to Trump when she met him at the White House in January, two weeks after he ordered US special forces to seize Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro from Caracas.<\/p>\n list of 4 items<\/span>end of list<\/span><\/section>\n Trump\u2019s military operation to remove Maduro, who is currently detained in the US facing drug trafficking charges, is \u201csomething we Venezuelans will never forget\u201d, she was quoted by AFP news agency as saying at a conference in Madrid on Saturday.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is a leader in the world, a head of state in the world, who risked the lives of his country\u2019s citizens for Venezuela\u2019s freedom,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Trump, who has long publicly coveted the Nobel Peace Prize, called Machado\u2019s presentation of the medal at the time a \u201cwonderful gesture of mutual respect\u201d.<\/p>\n The Norwegian Nobel Committee, which honoured Machado for her tireless campaign to restore democratic rights in Venezuela and her struggle to achieve a peaceful transition from authoritarian rule, made clear after the handover that the prize is nontransferable and cannot be revoked, shared or transferred to others.<\/p>\n Machado, who had been living in hiding before leaving Venezuela in December to collect her prize in Oslo, said she was coordinating her return to the country with Washington.<\/p>\n \u201cI am speaking with the US government, and we are working in coordination, with mutual respect and understanding,\u201d she said, adding that she believed Washington was \u201ckey to advancing a democratic transition\u201d in Venezuela.<\/p>\n Trump has, however, publicly questioned Machado\u2019s standing, calling her a \u201cvery nice woman\u201d but saying she lacks \u201crespect\u201d within Venezuela. He has instead backed Maduro\u2019s former vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, as the country\u2019s interim leader.<\/p>\n Venezuela\u2019s opposition last week called for presidential elections. Machado, who was banned from running in the disputed 2024 vote that returned Maduro to power, has not yet said whether she would stand in a future poll.<\/p>\n While in Spain, Machado declined a meeting with Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, citing his hosting of a progressive leaders\u2019 summit in Barcelona as proof the meeting was \u201cnot advisable\u201d. Sanchez had said he was willing to meet her at any time.<\/p>\n This snub comes in contrast to her frequent encounters with Sanchez\u2019s right-wing opponents.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Maria Corina Machado gave Trump her Nobel Peace Prize after the US leader captured Nicolas Maduro. By Al Jazeera staff, AFP and Reuters Published On 18 Apr 202618 Apr 2026 Venezuela\u2019s main opposition leader Maria Corina Machado says she has \u201cno regrets\u201d about giving US President Donald Trump her Nobel Peace Prize medal. Machado, the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8738,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latin-america-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Recommended Stories <\/h2>\n
US key to \u2018democratic transition\u2019<\/h2>\n
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