U.S. President Donald Trump is considering imposing sanctions on companies from other countries that do business with Venezuela to cut off revenues to President Nicolas Maduro, Trump\u2019s national security adviser John Bolton told Reuters TV on Friday. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re moving exactly in that direction,\u201d Bolton said when asked whether Trump would consider what are known as \u201csecondary sanctions.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are even now looking at a series of additional steps we could take,\u201d Bolton said in the interview. <\/p>\n
The United States and most other Western countries have thrown their backing behind Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, who invoked the constitution in January to declare himself interim president, arguing that Maduro\u2019s 2018 re-election was illegitimate. <\/p>\n
Oil provides 90 percent of export revenue for OPEC member Venezuela. The United States imposed sanctions on Venezuela\u2019s state-owned oil company PDVSA in January, preventing U.S. companies from dealing with it unless revenues went to a fund available to Guaido. <\/p>\n
The Trump administration has not yet slapped sanctions on companies from other countries that do business with PDVSA – but U.S. officials have been having \u201cconversations\u201d with oil trading houses and governments around the world to convince them to scale down their dealings with Maduro, Trump\u2019s Venezuela envoy Elliott Abrams said earlier on Friday. <\/p>\n
MONROE DOCTRINE
\nRussia and China support Maduro, who has said Guaido is a puppet of Washington. Maduro retains control of state functions and the loyalty of the country\u2019s military. <\/p>\n
Bolton said he was not concerned that the push to oust Maduro was losing momentum. <\/p>\n
\u201cI can tell you there\u2019s a lot going on beneath the surface. The opposition is in constant contact with large numbers of admirals and other supporters within the Maduro administration,\u201d Bolton said. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a struggle against an authoritarian government and it\u2019s obviously going to take some time,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Trump is looking at options – including sanctions – to respond to Russia\u2019s growing military presence in Venezuela, Bolton said. Two Russian air force planes carrying nearly 100 military personnel landed outside Caracas on Saturday. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not afraid to use the phrase \u2018Monroe Doctrine\u2019 in this administration,\u201d Bolton said, referring to the 1823 policy established by then-President James Monroe, widely seen in Latin America as a justification for U.S. armed intervention in the region. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd one of the purposes of the Monroe Doctrine was to prevent foreign interference and even recolonization,\u201d Bolton said. <\/p>\n
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\n\u201cIf you look at the presence of Cuban and Russian forces in Venezuela, you have to ask when will the people of Venezuela get to choose their government rather than foreigners?\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Venezuela\u2019s economic crisis, which has caused shortages of food and medicine, has pushed millions of people to flee the country. <\/p>\n
Trump is considering granting temporary protection from deportation to the more than 70,000 Venezuelans believed to be in the United States, but wants to focus first on ensuring there is a transition in the government of the country, Bolton said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to be sure that people are not put back into a difficult position if they\u2019re opponents of the Maduro regime. On the other hand, there are many families of Maduro regime supporters in this country that wanted out of Venezuela to be safe,\u201d Bolton said.<\/p>\n
Egypt Today<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
U.S. President Donald Trump is considering imposing sanctions on companies from other countries that do business with Venezuela to cut off revenues to President Nicolas Maduro, Trump\u2019s national security adviser John Bolton told Reuters TV on Friday. \u201cWe\u2019re moving exactly in that direction,\u201d Bolton said when asked whether Trump would consider what are known as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":129737,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7863],"tags":[19416,47196,45892,45891],"class_list":["post-129736","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english-section","tag-donald-trump","tag-juan-guaido","tag-nicolas-maduro","tag-pdvsa"],"yoast_head":"\n