The US says that it has reopened its embassy within the Venezuelan capital of Caracas after a seven-year hiatus, as President Donald Trump deepens ties with the South American nation’s new authorities.
The US embassy stated in a social media publish on Saturday that the flag over the embassy has been raised as soon as once more, in a ceremonial step that alerts the resumption of diplomatic actions in Venezuela.
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“The morning of March 14, 2019, the American flag was lowered for the ultimate time at US Embassy Caracas. This morning, on March 14, 2026, on the similar time, my crew and I raised the American flag—precisely seven years after it was lowered,” Cost d’Affaires Laura Dogu wrote within the publish.
“A brand new period for US-Venezuela relations has begun. Onward with Venezuela.”
The US restored diplomatic ties earlier this month, and Dogu, the embassy’s most senior diplomat, added that the US was dedicated to “staying with Venezuela”.
The Trump administration has held up Venezuela as a mannequin for regime change in different nations, together with Iran, which were in battle with the US.
The renewed diplomatic ties come after the US launched a lethal navy operation on January 3 on Venezuelan soil, culminating within the abduction of former President Nicolas Maduro and his spouse Cilia Flores.
Since Maduro’s removing, the socialist chief’s former vp, Delcy Rodriguez, has taken over as interim president, with Trump’s approval.
However the Trump administration has pressed Rodriguez’s authorities for a number of concessions, together with entry to the nation’s huge oil reserves and different pure sources.
In response, Rodriguez has championed legal guidelines to open the nation’s nationalised oil and mining sectors to overseas funding.
Her nation has additionally transferred roughly 80 million barrels of oil into US arms, which have then been bought by the Trump administration.
Trump and his allies have framed such developments as the start of a brand new period of comity with Venezuela, after years of rigidity between Caracas and Washington.
However critics level to feedback Trump has made threatening Rodriguez as proof of potential coercion.
“If she doesn’t do what’s proper, she goes to pay a really huge value, most likely greater than Maduro,” Trump stated in an interview with The Atlantic journal, printed on January 4.
Within the lead-up to Maduro’s abduction, Trump and advisers like Stephen Miller had argued that Venezuelan oil was, actually, US property, given the historical past of US oil exploration within the area and the 2007 push to expropriate property from US firms like ExxonMobil.
“American sweat, ingenuity and toil created the oil business in Venezuela,” Miller wrote final December on social media. “Its tyrannical expropriation was the most important recorded theft of American wealth and property.”
Authorized consultants, nonetheless, say such statements symbolize an erasure of Venezuelan sovereignty. Worldwide regulation ensures every nation “everlasting sovereignty” over its personal pure sources.
However the Trump administration has overtly talked about controlling Venezuela’s sources “indefinitely“.
“We’re going to run it, primarily,” Trump stated of Venezuela in his speech on January 3.
The US has continued to exert substantial management over Venezuela’s oil gross sales, even blocking its gasoline commerce with Cuba.
Proceeds from US-led oil gross sales, in the meantime, are deposited in a US-controlled checking account, to be divided up between the 2 nations.
Rodriguez urged Trump on Friday to ease remaining US sanctions on Venezuela as a way to open the door for improved financial situations within the nation.
