Washington/Mar-a-Lago, 05 January (H.S.): President Donald Trump escalated rhetoric against Venezuela's interim President Delcy Rodríguez Sunday via a telephone interview with The Atlantic, vowing she would pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro should she defy US directives post the Saturday raid capturing her predecessor Nicolás Maduro and wife Cilia Flores.
The stark admonition—delivered en route to his West Palm Beach golf course—reverses Saturday's Mar-a-Lago praise where Trump depicted Rodríguez as gracious after Secretary of State Marco Rubio's parley, quoting her acquiescence: We'll do whatever you need... she really has no choice.
Rodríguez's defiant retort—denouncing Maduro's extraction as barbaric kidnapping and pledging resource defense—provoked the riposte, as Venezuela's Supreme Court and Defence Minister Vladimir Padrino López installed her amid slain security ranks and smoldering Caracas sites including La Guaira port and airbases.
Trump defended regime change—America's audacious Caracas incursion sans congressional nod—as preferable to Venezuela's failed... disaster status, hinting reconstruction sans quagmire.
From Acclaim to Anathema
Saturday's presser lauded Rodríguez's pliancy toward Rubio, fueling US oversight until judicious transition; Sunday's pivot underscores impatience with her ready to defend our natural resources stance, implying escalated reprisals eclipsing Maduro's narco-terror arraignment today in Manhattan under Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein.
Critics decry interventionist redux—Iraq echoes—yet Trump differentiates hemispheric realpolitik: This is not the Middle East.
Caracas Stifled, Global Ripples
Sunday's Caracas slumbered under military pall—shuttered bazaars, barren boulevards—resident David Leal noting people are still shaken, as Padrino mobilized forces loyal despite casualties.
India's Left protests mirrored Latin/EU/UN condemnations; Rubio tempers with oil quarantine sans boots-on-ground, yet Trump's shadow looms.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
