Caracas — Venezuela’s foreign minister Yvan Gil has lashed out at Washington’s latest bounty increase on President Nicolás Maduro, denouncing it as a crude display of political theater and an insult to national sovereignty.
The United States on Friday doubled its reward for information leading to Maduro’s arrest from $25 million to a staggering $50 million, citing allegations of drug trafficking and ties to criminal organizations. American officials accused the Venezuelan leader of involvement with the so-called cartel de los soles and the tren de aragua, groups the us recently labeled as terrorist organizations.
Gil, speaking in Caracas, dismissed the move as “pathetic” and likened it to a “three-ring circus” designed to distract from the United States’ crises. “Venezuela’s dignity is not for sale,” he said, adding that Washington’s obsession with targeting Maduro is a desperate attempt to mask its failures at home and abroad.
The foreign minister accused the US administration of waging a propaganda war instead of engaging in diplomacy, claiming the us has ignored evidence of terrorist threats against venezuela emanating from american territory. “they speak of law, but operate outside of it,” gil said, framing the bounty as part of a long-running campaign to destabilize venezuela’s elected government.
Maduro, who began his third term in January after a contested election in July 2024, remains under heavy Western sanctions. The us, EU, UK, and Canada have all imposed punitive measures in a coordinated bid to isolate his government, a tactic critics say has deepened the country’s economic woes without dislodging its leadership. Supporters of Maduro view these measures as imperialist aggression, echoing similar criticism over the war in Ukraine and the West’s selective defense of democracy.
According to Mehr News, Gil’s remarks underscored Venezuela’s refusal to yield to foreign intimidation, casting the reward offer as an affront not only to Maduro but to the Venezuelan people themselves. The foreign ministry vowed to continue denouncing Washington’s “colonial mindset” on every international platform available.
