end of list<\/span><\/section>\n\u201cI spoke with Trump on October 10, the same day the prize was announced. Not since then,\u201d Machado said. \u201cBut I do want to say \u2013 on behalf of the Venezuelan people \u2013 how grateful we are for his courageous vision, the historical actions he has taken against this narcoterrorist regime, to dismantle this structure and bring Maduro to justice.\u201d<\/p>\n
The right-wing politician\u2019s comments came after Trump told reporters on Sunday that Machado \u201cdoesn\u2019t have the respect\u201d to lead Venezuela or the support of the people.<\/p>\n
Delcy Rodriguez, Venezuela\u2019s former vice president, has since been sworn in to lead the country on an interim basis.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it would be very tough for her to be the leader,\u201d Trump said of Machado. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t have the support or the respect within the country. She\u2019s a very nice woman, but she doesn\u2019t have the respect.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2023, Machado declared victory in the Venezuelan opposition\u2019s presidential primary after receiving 93 percent of the vote. But she was barred from running, forcing her to go into hiding for more than a year before defying a travel ban to accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway.<\/p>\n
Machado left the capital, Oslo, in December, but her current whereabouts are unknown.<\/p>\n
The opposition leader told Hannity she plans to return to Venezuela \u201cas soon as possible\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u2018A huge step for humanity\u2019<\/h2>\n
Machado, a hard right-winger who has aligned herself with hawks in the Trump administration, stirred international controversy when she first dedicated her prize to Trump in October.<\/p>\n
Trump had coveted the Nobel Peace Prize for months, publicly campaigning that he had \u201cended seven wars\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI dedicated it to President Trump because I believed, at that time, that he deserved it,\u201d Machado told Hannity. Now, after deposing Maduro, \u201che has proven to the world what he means\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not only huge for the Venezuelan people and their future \u2026 it\u2019s a huge step for humanity, for freedom, and human dignity,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
The White House indicated on Sunday that it was not seeking regime change in Venezuela, but rather a docile government that will allow US companies to exploit the country\u2019s vast oil reserves.<\/p>\n
Trump had previously said he would \u201crun\u201d Venezuela as \u201cvery large United States oil companies\u201d tapped its resources.<\/p>\n
Machado seemed to welcome this idea, telling Hannity that Venezuela would transform into an \u201cenergy hub\u201d for the US.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will bring rule of law, we will open markets, we will bring security for investments,\u201d Machado said.<\/p>\n
The abduction of Maduro was an attack by the US that skirted not only international law but also US political limits, various international experts and analysts have said.<\/p>\n
It is part of the US\u2019s \u201cnew imperialistic era\u201d centred on oil and strategic interests and risks normalising similar actions by other powers, Sultan Barakat, senior professor at the College of Public Policy at Qatar\u2019s Hamad Bin Khalifa University, told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n
Trump is \u201cbypassing \u2026 international law. He\u2019s bypassing Venezuelan law \u2026 and he doesn\u2019t seem to give a damn about what the people of Venezuela really think or want,\u201d Barakat said.<\/p>\n
Trump-era policies and rhetoric have \u201cmutated\u201d US politics as nationalism has intensified and Christianity has become more entwined with governance \u2013 trends that will distort the existing international order, he added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The opposition leader tells Fox News she is \u2018grateful\u2019 for Trump\u2019s \u2018courageous vision\u2019 after Maduro\u2019s abduction. Venezuela\u2019s opposition leader, Maria Corina Machado, says she has not spoken to United States President Donald Trump since October last year, even as she fulsomely lauds his administration\u2019s brazen military actions in Venezuela. In a brief interview with Sean […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5733,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7685","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\/7685","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=7685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inernews.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}