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Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Saturday that Cuban leaders should be concerned following the U.S. military operation in Venezuela and the arrest of President Nicolás Maduro. Rubio said the operation and subsequent developments could signal a shift in focus toward Cuba under President Donald Trump’s administration, Fox News reported.
Cuba has long maintained a significant presence in Venezuela, including intelligence agents and security personnel, amid close ties between Havana and Caracas.
Rubio said Venezuela’s intelligence agency was “basically full of Cubans” and that Maduro’s security detail also included Cuban personnel.
“One of the biggest problems Venezuelans have is they have to declare independence from Cuba,” Rubio said during a news conference detailing the operation.
“They tried to basically colonize it from a security standpoint,” he added.
Rubio described Cuba as “a disaster” run by leaders he characterized as incompetent.
The Secretary of State has repeatedly labeled Cuba a dictatorship and a failed state.
“If I lived in Havana, and I was in the government, I’d be concerned — at least a little bit,” Rubio said.
Trump said Cuba is a topic his administration will eventually address, calling the country “a very badly failing nation.”
“And we want to help the people,” Trump said.
“It’s very similar in the sense that we want to help the people in Cuba, but we also want to help the people who were forced out of Cuba and are living in this country,” he added.
Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were taken into custody by U.S. forces during the operation and transported aboard the USS Iwo Jima.
They are expected to be brought to the United States to face federal charges.
U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said the couple, along with other Venezuelan officials, face charges including drug trafficking and narco terrorism conspiracies.
Bondi said the defendants are accused of partnering with drug cartels to traffic narcotics into the United States.
“Maduro and his wife will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts,” Bondi wrote.
The charges include narco terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices against the United States.
Deposed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was seeking renewed talks with the United States before he was captured overnight in a stunning raid by U.S. military and law enforcement elements. His capture followed months of tanker seizures a recent U.S. strike, and targeting of boats ferrying deadly narcotics out of the country.
According to Reuters, Maduro offered potential U.S. access to Venezuela’s oil reserves and proposed restarting dialogue on counter-narcotics cooperation. Speaking on state television recently, he suggested reopening the door to investment by Chevron and urged Trump to engage in discussions aimed at cooperating to combat drug trafficking.
Venezuela has been serving as a hub for drug-smuggling and dangerous cartels such as Tren de Aragua and the Maduro-tied Cartel de los Soles.
“To the people of the United States I say what I have always said, Venezuela is a brother country… a friendly government,” Maduro said during his address. “We must start to speak seriously, with the facts in hand. The U.S. government knows that, because we have said it a lot to their interlocutors, that if they want to speak seriously about the agreement to battle drug trafficking, we are ready to do that.”
“If they want Venezuela’s oil, Venezuela is ready to accept U.S. investments like those of Chevron, when, where and how they want to make them,” Maduro added. Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, but the industry has been hit hard during the reigns of Maduro and his socialist dictator predecessor, Hugo Chavez.
