By Joseph Tanfani
(Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday that his administration may be open to talks with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who faces increasing pressure from the United States amid a military buildup in the Caribbean.
“We may be having some discussions with Maduro, and we’ll see how that turns out,” Trump told reporters on Sunday evening in West Palm Beach, Florida, before getting on a flight back to Washington. “They would like to talk.”
Trump offered no further details about the possibility of talks, though he suggested he would keep up the pressure on the Maduro regime.
“We’re stopping drug dealers and drugs from coming into our country,” Trump said.
The Venezuelan communications ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Earlier on Sunday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the State Department would designate an alleged drug organization, Cartel de los Soles, as a “foreign terrorist organization,” which makes it a crime for anyone in the United States to provide material support to the group. U.S. officials have accused Cartel de los Soles of working with the criminal organization Tren de Aragua to send narcotics to the United States.
The Trump administration has said that Maduro leads Cartel de Los Soles, which he denies. The Pentagon has deployed warships, fighter jets and a nuclear submarine to the Caribbean as U.S. officials consider taking military action against the Maduro government.
The news of possible discussions between the United States and Venezuela came as the Pentagon announced another attack on an alleged drug trafficking boat in the eastern Pacific. The attack on Saturday killed three people, the Pentagon said.
“Intelligence confirmed that the vessel was involved in illicit narcotics smuggling, transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and carrying narcotics,” the U.S. Southern Command announced in a post on social media. The announcement said the boat was in international waters when it was struck by Joint Task Force Southern Spear.
It was the 21st known attack on drug boats by the U.S. military since early September in what it has called a justified effort to disrupt the flow of narcotics into the United States. The strikes have killed more than 80 people, according to Pentagon figures.
Lawmakers in the U.S. Congress, human rights groups and U.S. allies have raised questions about the legality of the attacks. The Trump administration has said it has the legal authority to carry out the strikes, with the Justice Department providing a legal opinion that justifies them and argues that U.S. military personnel who carry out the operations are immune from prosecution.
(Reporting by Joseph Tanfani; Editing by Sergio Non, Edmund Klamann and Leslie Adler)
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