NEWS

Former Colombian President Ivan Duque Marquez, discusses how Colombia’s could play a supporting role in Venezuela transition after the abduction of Nicolas Maduro. US President Donald Trump has threatened military action against Colombia, accusing its government of making and selling cocaine to the United States.

The move comes after star Bangladesh fast bowler Mustafizur Rahman was dropped by his IPL team on the BCCI’s directives.

Bangladesh’s interim government has banned broadcast ‍of this ‍year’s Indian Premier League (IPL), the latest flashpoint in a growing row with neighbouring India, which has now extended to cricket ties between the two nations.

The move follows the decision by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to have the Kolkata Knight Riders drop Bangladesh pacer Mustafizur Rahman, ​who had signed for the IPL franchise for ‍this season.

The unceremonious dumping of a “star player” like Mustafizur from the IPL “defied logic” and had “hurt people”, the country’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting said in a statement explaining its decision.

Bangladesh have also refused to play their matches of next month’s Twenty20 (T20) World Cup in India, demanding that those ‍be staged ⁠in Sri Lanka, co-host of the 20-team tournament.

The Bangladesh Cricket Board’s directors met in an emergency meeting on Sunday and confirmed their decision shortly afterwards.

“Following a thorough assessment of the prevailing situation and the growing concerns regarding the safety and security of the Bangladesh contingent in India and considering the advice from the Bangladesh Government, the board of directors resolved that the Bangladesh national team will not travel to India for the tournament under the current conditions,” it said.

“The board believes that such a step is necessary to safeguard the safety and wellbeing of Bangladeshi players, team officials, Board members and other stakeholders and to ensure that the team can participate in the tournament in a secure and appropriate environment,” the statement added, urging the ICC to take swift action.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has not publicly responded to Bangladesh’s ‌demand to play World Cup matches in Sri Lanka.

Tensions have risen ‌in recent weeks between India ⁠and Bangladesh.

Following the protests, the Indian board asked ‍Knight Riders to drop Mustafizur.

The IPL, the ​world’s richest T20 league, is scheduled ‌from March 26 to May 31.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is to appear in a New York court on Monday, two days after he was abducted by US special forces in a military operation in Caracas.

The US military arrested Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, on Saturday and brought them to New York, where they face multiple federal charges, including drugs and weapons charges.

Here is more about Maduro’s scheduled court appearance:

When and where will it take place?

Maduro is to appear before a federal judge at noon (17:00 GMT).

The appearance is scheduled to happen in the Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse in the Southern District of New York. Maduro is to appear before US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein.

A court spokesperson told NBC News that Flores, who is also listed as a defendant in a US indictment unsealed on Saturday, will appear in court on Monday as well.

What are the charges?

According to the indictment, the US accuses Maduro of being at the forefront of corruption to “use his illegally obtained authority” to “transport thousands of tons of cocaine” to the US with his coconspirators.

Additionally, the indictment alleges that Maduro has “tarnished” every public office he has held. It adds that Maduro “allows cocaine-fueled corruption to flourish for his own benefit, for the benefit of members of his ruling regime, and for the benefit of his family members”.

Maduro faces four counts:

• Count 1, narcoterrorism conspiracy: US prosecutors say Maduro and his coconspirators knowingly provided something of financial value to US-designated “foreign terrorist organizations” and their members. The indictment lists these organisations as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a leftist rebel group that signed a peace deal in 2016 but has dissidents who refused to lay down their arms and are still involved in the drug trade; Segunda Marquetalia, the largest dissident FARC group; National Liberation Army, another leftist Colombian rebel group; Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel; Los Zetas/Cartel del Noreste, another Mexican drug cartel; and Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang.
• Count 2, cocaine importation conspiracy: It accuses Maduro and his codefendants of conspiring to manufacture, distribute and import cocaine into the US.
• Count 3, possession of machineguns and destructive devices: The indictment accuses the defendants of possessing, carrying and using machineguns in relation to the above drug‑trafficking counts.
• Count 4, conspiracy to possess machineguns and destructive devices: It further accuses the defendants of conspiring to use, carry and possess those weapons in furtherance of drug trafficking.

The indictment also says Maduro and his codefendants should forfeit to the US government any proceeds and assets obtained from the alleged crimes.

Is there evidence for these charges?

There is little evidence that drugs are trafficked from Venezuela on a large scale. The 2023 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime World Drug Report said global cocaine production hit a record of 3,708 tonnes, up nearly one‑third from 2022, with most coca cultivation taking place in Colombia, followed by Peru and Bolivia.

Trafficking routes into the US in 2023-2024 primarily passed through Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, not Venezuela, although it does serve as a minor transit corridor for Colombian cocaine moving into the eastern Caribbean.

Who is named in the indictment?

Maduro

Maduro, 63, who became Venezuela’s president in 2013, was declared the winner of 2024’s election. His re-election was rejected as fraudulent by the US and independent observers, such as the Carter Center. A UN expert panel said the 2024 vote failed to meet international standards.

Nine Latin American countries called for a review of the results with independent oversight.

Maduro defended the election results and accused his opponents of undermining the country’s sovereignty.

Since returning to the White House nearly a year ago, US President Donald Trump has expanded sanctions and punitive measures against Maduro and senior officials in his government.

The Trump administration ramped up military pressure starting in August when it deployed warships and thousand of its service members in the Caribbean near Venezuela. It has since carried out dozens of air strikes on alleged Venezuelan drug boats, killing more than 100 people.

Maduro has pushed back by mobilising Venezuelan military personnel.

During this time, the Caracas-based news network Globovision quoted Maduro as saying: “From the north, the empire has gone mad and, like a rotten rehash, has renewed its threats to the peace and stability of Venezuela.”

But a day before Saturday’s US attack on the country, Maduro had offered to hold talks to combat drug trafficking.

Flores

Flores, 69, has been married to Maduro since 2013.

Known as the “first combatant” rather than first lady, Flores is a veteran lawyer and politician who rose to prominence by defending future President Hugo Chavez after his failed 1992 coup. She helped secure his release and later became a key Chavismo figure and the first woman to preside over Venezuela’s National Assembly. Chavismo, which promotes socialism and anti-imperialist politics, is the political movement started by Chavez, Maduro’s mentor.

The indictment accuses Flores of joining Maduro’s cocaine importation conspiracy.

Other defendants

The indictment names four other people as Maduro’s coconspirators, namely Diosdado Cabello, Venezuela’s interior minister; Ramon Rodriguez Chacin, former Venezuelan interior minister; Nicolas Maduro Guerra, Maduro’s son and a Venezuelan politician; and Hector Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, the leader of Tren de Aragua, which was designated as a “foreign terrorist organization” by the US in February. But most experts do not define Tren de Aragua as a “terrorist organisation”.

It is not clear yet who will represent Maduro, Flores and the other defendants.

Who is the judge?

Hellerstein was born in 1933 in New York. He was appointed to the federal bench in 1998 by former President Bill Clinton.

He is likely on Monday to advise Maduro and Flores about their rights and ask them if they want to enter a plea.

What’s at stake?

Maduro’s freedom is primarily at stake. If convicted, he could face 30 years to life in prison.

“This is less about Maduro as it is about access to Venezuela’s oil deposits,” Ilias Bantekas, a professor of transnational law at Hamad Bin Khalifa University in Qatar, told Al Jazeera. “This is the number one target. Trump is not content with just allowing US oil firms to get concessions but to ‘run’ the country, which entails absolute and indefinite control over Venezuela’s resources.”

Venezuela’s oil reserves are concentrated primarily in the Orinoco Belt, a region in the eastern part of the country stretching across roughly 55,000sq km (21,235sq miles).

While the country is home to the world’s largest proven oil reserves – at an estimated 303 billion barrels as of 2023 – it earns only a fraction of the revenue it once did from exporting crude due to mismanagement and US sanctions.

Last month, Trump accused Venezuela in a post on his Truth Social platform of “stealing” US oil, land and other assets and using that oil to fund crime, “terrorism” and human trafficking.

Trump repeated his false claims after Maduro’s arrest. During a news conference on Saturday, Trump said the US would “run” Venezuela until a “safe, proper and judicious transition” could be carried out.

“Given the opposition of all South American states, save for Argentina, to US dominance in the region, Trump’s plan requires a vast military deployment. We need to see how countries like Brazil and Colombia react to this, including also BRICS,” said Bantekas from Hamad Bin Khalifa University.

In a joint statement released on Sunday, the governments of Spain, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Uruguay said the US actions in Venezuela “constitute an extremely dangerous precedent for peace and regional security and endanger the civilian population”.

Was Maduro’s abduction legal?

This case is unusual because there are questions about how Maduro was captured and whether it was legal. Russia, China and other Venezuelan allies have accused the US of violating international law.

“If there was an armed conflict between Venezuela and the USA and, given that Maduro is the head of his country’s armed forces, then he would be a legitimate target,” Bantekas said.

“However, under the circumstances there is no armed conflict between the two countries and in the absence of an armed attack by Venezuela against the US, the latter’s invasion in Venezuela violates article 2(4) of the UN Charter, as does the abduction of the country’s President. It is a blatant act of aggression.”

Article 2(4) of the UN Charter bars UN members from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.

A United Nations Security Council meeting on Monday will determine the legality of the US abduction of Maduro.

“Given that Maduro is already in US custody and in the USA, it is in the interests of all parties that he appear before a court. At the very least, Maduro can challenge the legality of his arrest and the jurisdiction of the court,” Bantekas said.

“The court itself has an obligation to decide if it has jurisdiction and as a preliminary issue decide whether Maduro enjoys immunity from criminal prosecution. If these issues are dispensed the court nonetheless finds that it has jurisdiction and that Maduro does not enjoy immunity, then the prosecutor must prove its case.”

What’s next?

The Trump administration has not explicitly stated a clear plan for Venezuela, with analysts saying the administration has sent out confusing signals.

In an interview with the NBC news channels on Sunday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio suggested that Washington will not govern Venezuela on a day-to-day basis besides enforcing an existing “oil quarantine”.

Rubio told ABC news on Sunday that the US had leverage over Venezuela and the US would “set the conditions” to ensure that Venezuela is no longer a “narco-trafficking paradise”.

But on Sunday, Trump told reporters that the US is ready to carry out a second military strike on Venezuela if its government refuses to cooperate with his plan to ‘resolve’ the situation there.

She could “pay a very big price” if she “does not do what’s right”, Trump said, refering Venezuela’s new leader, Delcy Rodriguez.

During his Saturday conference, Trump said that Rodriguez told Rubio that she will do what the US needs her to. “She really doesn’t have a choice,” Trump had said.

In his first press conference after Maduro’s illegal abduction on Saturday, Trump ruled out the possibility of working with opposition leader and Nobel Prize winner Maria Corina Machado, who was barred from running in the 2024 presidential elections.

Machado, a member of the Venezuelan National Assembly, is seen as the most credible adversary of Maduro’s leftist government.

On Monday, Rodriguez, the interim leader, offered to cooperate with Trump. In a statement posted on social media, she invited Trump to “collaborate” and sought “respectful relations”.

“President Donald Trump, our peoples and our region deserve peace and dialogue, not war,” she wrote.

Her conciliatory tone came a day after she appeared on state TV declaring that Maduro was still Venezuela’s sole legitimate president.

Last week, a prominent Saudi Sheikh, Mohammed Al-Issa, visited the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland to commemorate the 75th anniversary of its liberation, which signalled the end of the Nazi Holocaust. Although dozens of Muslim scholars have visited the site, where about one million Jews were killed during World War Two, according to the Auschwitz Memorial Centre’s press office, Al-Issa is the most senior Muslim religious leader to do so.

Visiting Auschwitz is not a problem for a Muslim; Islam orders Muslims to reject unjustified killing of any human being, no matter what their faith is. Al-Issa is a senior ally of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman (MBS), who apparently cares little for the sanctity of human life, though, and the visit to Auschwitz has very definite political connotations beyond any Islamic context.

By sending Al-Issa to the camp, Bin Salman wanted to show his support for Israel, which exploits the Holocaust for geopolitical colonial purposes. “The Israeli government decided that it alone was permitted to mark the 75th anniversary of the Allied liberation of Auschwitz [in modern day Poland] in 1945,” wrote journalist Richard Silverstein recently when he commented on the gathering of world leaders in Jerusalem for Benjamin Netanyahu’s Holocaust event.

READ: Next up, a Saudi embassy in Jerusalem 

Bin Salman uses Al Issa for such purposes, as if to demonstrate his own Zionist credentials. For example, the head of the Makkah-based Muslim World League is leading rapprochement efforts with Evangelical Christians who are, in the US at least, firm Zionists in their backing for the state of Israel. Al-Issa has called for a Muslim-Christian-Jewish interfaith delegation to travel to Jerusalem in what would, in effect, be a Zionist troika.

Zionism is not a religion, and there are many non-Jewish Zionists who desire or support the establishment of a Jewish state in occupied Palestine. The definition of Zionism does not mention the religion of its supporters, and Israeli writer Sheri Oz, is just one author who insists that non-Jews can be Zionists.

Mohammad Bin Salman and Netanyahu – Cartoon [Tasnimnews.com/Wikipedia]

We should not be shocked, therefore, to see a Zionist Muslim leader in these trying times. It is reasonable to say that Bin Salman’s grandfather and father were Zionists, as close friends of Zionist leaders. Logic suggests that Bin Salman comes from a Zionist dynasty.

This has been evident from his close relationship with Zionists and positive approaches to the Israeli occupation and establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine, calling it “[the Jews’] ancestral homeland”. This means that he has no issue with the ethnic cleansing of almost 800,000 Palestinians in 1948, during which thousands were killed and their homes demolished in order to establish the Zionist state of Israel.

“The ‘Jewish state’ claim is how Zionism has tried to mask its intrinsic Apartheid, under the veil of a supposed ‘self-determination of the Jewish people’,” wrote Israeli blogger Jonathan Ofir in Mondoweiss in 2018, “and for the Palestinians it has meant their dispossession.”

As the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, Crown Prince Bin Salman has imprisoned dozens of Palestinians, including representatives of Hamas. In doing so he is serving Israel’s interests. Moreover, he has blamed the Palestinians for not making peace with the occupation state. Bin Salman “excoriated the Palestinians for missing key opportunities,” wrote Danial Benjamin in Moment magazine. He pointed out that the prince’s father, King Salman, has played the role of counterweight by saying that Saudi Arabia “permanently stands by Palestine and its people’s right to an independent state with occupied East Jerusalem as its capital.”

UN expert: Saudi crown prince behind hack on Amazon CEO 

Israeli journalist Barak Ravid of Israel’s Channel 13 News reported Bin Salman as saying: “In the last several decades the Palestinian leadership has missed one opportunity after the other and rejected all the peace proposals it was given. It is about time the Palestinians take the proposals and agree to come to the negotiations table or shut up and stop complaining.” This is reminiscent of the words of the late Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban, one of the Zionist founders of Israel, that the Palestinians “never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”

Bin Salman’s Zionism is also very clear in his bold support for US President Donald Trump’s deal of the century, which achieves Zionist goals in Palestine at the expense of Palestinian rights. He participated in the Bahrain conference, the forum where the economic side of the US deal was announced, where he gave “cover to several other Arab countries to attend the event and infuriated the Palestinians.”

US President Donald Trump looks over at Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammad bin Salman al-Saud as they line up for the family photo during the opening day of Argentina G20 Leaders’ Summit 2018 at Costa Salguero on 30 November 2018 in Buenos Aires, Argentina [Daniel Jayo/Getty Images]

While discussing the issue of the current Saudi support for Israeli policies and practices in Palestine with a credible Palestinian official last week, he told me that the Palestinians had contacted the Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to ask him not to relocate his country’s embassy to Jerusalem. “The Saudis have been putting pressure on us in order to relocate our embassy to Jerusalem,” replied the Brazilian leader. What more evidence of Mohammad Bin Salman’s Zionism do we need?

The founder of Friends of Zion Museum is American Evangelical Christian Mike Evans. He said, after visiting a number of the Gulf States, that, “The leaders [there] are more pro-Israel than a lot of Jews.” This was a specific reference to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince, and his counterpart in the UAE, Mohammed Bin Zayed.

“All versions of Zionism lead to the same reactionary end of unbridled expansionism and continued settler colonial genocide of [the] Palestinian people,” Israeli-American writer and photographer Yoav Litvin wrote for Al Jazeera. We may well see an Israeli Embassy opened in Riyadh in the near future, and a Saudi Embassy in Tel Aviv or, more likely, Jerusalem. Is Mohammad Bin Salman a Zionist? There’s no doubt about it.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

I listened to the January 3 press conference with a knot in my stomach. As a Venezuelan American with family, memories, and a living connection to the country being spoken about as if it were a possession, what I heard was very clear. And that clarity was chilling.

The president said, plainly, that the United States would “run the country” until a transition it deems “safe” and “judicious.” He spoke about capturing Venezuela’s head of state, about transporting him on a U.S. military vessel, about administering Venezuela temporarily, and about bringing in U.S. oil companies to rebuild the industry. He dismissed concerns about international reaction with a phrase that should alarm everyone: “They understand this is our hemisphere.”

For Venezuelans, those words echo a long, painful history.

Let’s be clear about the claims made. The president is asserting that the U.S. can detain a sitting foreign president and his spouse under U.S. criminal law. That the U.S. can administer another sovereign country without an international mandate. That Venezuela’s political future can be decided from Washington. That control over oil and “rebuilding” is a legitimate byproduct of intervention. That all of this can happen without congressional authorization and without evidence of imminent threat.

We have heard this language before. In Iraq, the United States promised a limited intervention and a temporary administration, only to impose years of occupation, seize control of critical infrastructure, and leave behind devastation and instability. What was framed as stewardship became domination. Venezuela is now being spoken about in disturbingly similar terms. “Temporary Administration” ended up being a permanent disaster.

Under international law, nothing described in that press conference is legal. The UN Charter prohibits the threat or use of force against another state and bars interference in a nation’s political independence. Sanctions designed to coerce political outcomes and cause civilian suffering amount to collective punishment. Declaring the right to “run” another country is the language of occupation, regardless of how many times the word is avoided.

Under U.S. law, the claims are just as disturbing. War powers belong to Congress. There has been no authorization, no declaration, no lawful process that allows an executive to seize a foreign head of state or administer a country. Calling this “law enforcement” does not make it so. Venezuela poses no threat to the United States. It has not attacked the U.S. and has issued no threat that could justify the use of force under U.S. or international law. There is no lawful basis, domestic or international, for what is being asserted.

But beyond law and precedent lies the most important reality: the cost of this aggression is paid by ordinary people in Venezuela. War, sanctions, and military escalation do not fall evenly. They fall hardest on women, children, the elderly, and the poor. They mean shortages of medicine and food, disrupted healthcare systems, rising maternal and infant mortality, and the daily stress of survival in a country forced to live under siege. They also mean preventable deaths,  people who die not because of natural disaster or inevitability, but because access to care, electricity, transport, or medicine has been deliberately obstructed. Every escalation compounds existing harm and increases the likelihood of loss of life, civilian deaths that will be written off as collateral, even though they were foreseeable and avoidable.

What makes this even more dangerous is the assumption underlying it all: that Venezuelans will remain passive, compliant, and submissive in the face of humiliation and force. That assumption is wrong. And when it collapses, as it inevitably will, the cost will be measured in unnecessary bloodshed.  This is what is erased when a country is discussed as a “transition” or an “administration problem.” Human beings disappear. Lives are reduced to acceptable losses. And the violence that follows is framed as unfortunate rather than the predictable outcome of arrogance and coercion.

To hear a U.S. president talk about a country as something to be managed, stabilized, and handed over once it behaves properly, it hurts. It humiliates. And it enrages.

And yes, Venezuela is not politically unified. It isn’t. It never has been. There are deep divisions, about the government, about the economy, about leadership, about the future. There are people who identify as Chavista, people who are fiercely anti-Chavista, people who are exhausted and disengaged, and yes, there are some who are celebrating what they believe might finally bring change.

But political division does not invite invasion. 

Latin America has seen this logic before. In Chile, internal political division was used to justify U.S. intervention, framed as a response to “ungovernability,” instability, and threats to regional order, ending not in democracy, but in dictatorship, repression, and decades of trauma.

In fact, many Venezuelans who oppose the government still reject this moment outright. They understand that bombs, sanctions, and “transitions” imposed from abroad do not bring democracy, they destroy the conditions that make it possible. 

This moment demands political maturity, not purity tests. You can oppose Maduro and still oppose U.S. aggression. You can want change and still reject foreign control. You can be angry, desperate, or hopeful, and still say no to being governed by another country.

Venezuela is a country where communal councils, worker organizations, neighborhood collectives, and social movements have been forged under pressure. Political education didn’t come from think tanks; it came from survival. Right now, Venezuelans are not hiding. They are closing ranks because they recognize the pattern. They know what it means when foreign leaders start talking about “transitions” and “temporary control.” They know what usually follows. And they are responding the way they always have: by turning fear into collective action.

This press conference wasn’t just about Venezuela. It was about whether empire can say the quiet part out loud again, whether it can openly claim the right to govern other nations and expect the world to shrug.

If this stands, the lesson is brutal and undeniable: sovereignty is conditional, resources are there to be taken by the U.S., and democracy exists only by imperial consent.

As a Venezuelan American, I refuse that lesson.

I refuse the idea that my tax dollars fund the humiliation of my homeland. I refuse the lie that war and coercion are acts of “care” for the Venezuelan people. And I refuse to stay silent while a country I love is spoken about as raw material for U.S. interests, not a society of human beings deserving respect.

Venezuela’s future is not for U.S. officials, corporate boards, or any president who believes the hemisphere is his to command. It belongs to Venezuelans.

Michelle Ellner is a Latin America campaign coordinator of CODEPINK. She was born in Venezuela and holds a bachelor’s degree in languages and international affairs from the University La Sorbonne Paris IV, in Paris. After graduating, she worked for an international scholarship program out of offices in Caracas and Paris and was sent to Haiti, Cuba, The Gambia, and other countries for the purpose of evaluating and selecting applicants.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Venezuelanalysis editorial staff.

Following overnight U.S. airstrikes on Caracas, the seizure of President Nicolás Maduro, and President Donald Trump’s declaration that Washington will take control of Venezuela’s oil and effectively run the country, analysts Steve Ellner and Ricardo Vaz warn that the operation constitutes an unlawful use of force.

They cite the combination of military assault, extraterritorial abduction, resource seizure, and alleged extrajudicial killings at sea as violations of international law and Venezuelan sovereignty.

Events in Yemen are escalating quickly and dramatically, reaching the point of armed clashes erupting between the Arab coalition supporting the internationally recognised government in Yemen, led by Saudi Arabia, and the so‑called “Southern Transitional Council” (STC), backed by the United Arab Emirates.

Many view these developments as a natural outcome of a long, cumulative trajectory of complexities the country has experienced since the civil war erupted in late 2014, and the humanitarian and economic repercussions that followed.

External interventions had a profound impact in creating political and administrative chaos that intensified internal divisions and exposed what remained of the legitimate state to further weakness, culminating in the loss of its most important sovereign tools: unity of territory and decision-making. These developments and events add further complexity to an already complex picture, and Yemen will not be safe from their future repercussions.

On the other hand, others view the situation from another, less bleak angle. The strong reaction to the STC’s moves — on the part of the Yemeni president (chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council, or PLC) and, behind him, the Saudi‑led Arab coalition — is a new and important variable, completely different from the usual approach to many similar events. So, there is hope that these events and changes will mark a new phase that works to correct the imbalances and deviations that accompanied the Arab coalition’s intervention over more than a decade.

Watching carefully are the Houthi rebels in northern Yemen, who have remained silent, apparently waiting to see what these events will produce as they continue to strike at the unity of the components of the Arab coalition’s leadership and undermine the legitimate government. In any case, they realise that the eventual outcome will ultimately be in their favour. Therefore, the Houthis, according to multiple reports, are currently intensifying their military preparations, redeploying and dispersing their forces along the theatre of operations adjacent to contact points on the fronts: the northeast (Marib), and the southwest in Taiz and Bab al-Mandeb, preparing for zero hour.

So, what is the nature and background of this bilateral conflict between allies? Where have these events and developments led Yemen, and where will they lead it? And what are their implications for the future of the country and the region?

There is broad agreement that what is happening today is merely an initial result of a deep internal conflict of interests between the two main coalition states — Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Although most of this conflict remained hidden, its accumulations continued to roll and grow like a snowball.

To understand how matters reached this point of an explosion of conflict between allies, we must first understand the background of this rivalry and conflict.

In late March 2015, Saudi Arabia led a coalition of 10 Arab and Muslim countries to intervene militarily in Yemen — later it was called the Coalition to Support Legitimacy in Yemen, with the aim of restoring the authority of Yemen’s former legitimate president, Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, from the grip of the Houthi coup forces.

At the outset, the coalition achieved major, tangible successes on the ground before differences began to emerge between the two main allies, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

There is a widespread and well‑grounded belief that the UAE entered this war with a plan to achieve purely geopolitical and strategic interests. Some argue, however, that this was not necessarily the case at the beginning, but that it may later have turned to exploiting weakness, vacuum, and internal divisions in order to redraw its strategy anew in light of that.

On the ground, the UAE formed, trained, and financed local forces loyal to it, using them to achieve its own objectives, away from the coalition and the legitimate government. Within just two years of its intervention, it managed — through its own local forces — to impose control over all strategic maritime outlets along southern and eastern Yemen, reaching the western coast of Taiz governorate in the country’s southwest, where the strategic Bab al-Mandeb Strait lies.

Over 10 years of the coalition’s intervention, the UAE established and built a hard-hitting army of its own militias, becoming the strongest force on the ground and the greatest threat to the interests of its ally (Saudi Arabia) in Yemen, including the system and the legitimate government that it had supported and sponsored from the outset. It can be affirmed that Riyadh committed fatal strategic mistakes in dealing with these deviations, remaining silent and failing to take decisive action on the ground to curb its ally’s overreach — perhaps settling for minor protective measures, and often acting merely as a “mediator” to resolve disputes that flared up from time to time — until the axe finally struck the head.

Military escalation

In early December, the STC, which was founded and backed by the UAE, triggered a military escalation by seizing control of the governorates of Hadramout and al-Mahra in eastern Yemen. This angered Saudi Arabia and pushed it out of its usual diplomacy and calm. Many may interpret this major shift in its policy as stemming from the fact that it views these two eastern governorates bordering it as a geographic extension of its national security, and that any compromise to their security constitutes a direct threat to its national security, something Riyadh stated explicitly in its recent statements issued in the wake of the crisis.

Accordingly, the head of the PLC dealt with these developments with great seriousness, describing them as unacceptable “unilateral measures”. Under the authority granted by the Power Transfer Declaration (April 2022), he called on the Saudi-led Arab coalition to intervene militarily.

The next day, coalition aircraft struck military equipment that had arrived on two ships from the UAE’s Fujairah port to the port of Mukalla in Hadramout. In response, Yemeni President Rashad al-Alimi declared a state of emergency and called on the UAE to end its presence in Yemen. Later that day, the UAE Ministry of Defence announced the withdrawal of what remained of its forces in Yemen (the UAE had previously announced in October 2019 that it was withdrawing its forces from Yemen).

The military escalation led to major, rapidly unfolding military and political repercussions, particularly after the STC continued to refuse to heed calls and threats by the coalition leadership and the Yemeni president to withdraw its forces from the two governorates.

Someone could ask: Why does the STC refuse to withdraw its forces despite the threats and successive strikes? The answer is that doing so would deal a powerful blow to its secessionist project. Clearly, the council’s takeover of these two governorates — both of which reject its project — raised broad hopes among southern separatists of declaring their state, but Saudi Arabia’s decisive intervention (in the name of the Arab coalition) dealt a crushing blow to that project.

Escalation and repercussions

With the start of the new year, government ground forces — formed by the Yemeni president through a presidential decision on January 27, 2023 under the name Homeland Shield, with Saudi support — began moving towards Hadramout and al-Mahra (east) to liberate them from STC forces, under air cover and support from coalition aircraft, and liberation and control operations began. In response, forces from the UAE-backed Giants Brigades, coming from Taiz’s western coast, moved towards Hadramout governorate to reinforce and support STC forces.

Amid the accelerating escalation and its repercussions, the head of the STC, Aidarous al-Zubaidi — also a member of the PLC — moved quickly to issue what he called a “constitutional declaration” (January 2, 2026), in which he announced what he termed the independent “State of the Arab South”, during a two-year transitional period.

While the country’s official institutions at the national, regional, and global levels have so far ignored this declaration, many Yemenis dealt with it ambivalently, each according to their affiliations and loyalties.

For the Southern separatists, they expressed overwhelming joy at the announcement of their state, while their opponents mocked the move as a leap over reality, an attempt to escape forward over facts and local and international laws and regulations. Some considered it merely a desperate attempt to rid the council of the pressure of promises it had made to those dreaming of secession, at a time when it became evident that secession was no longer easy after the recent events and developments.

Regardless of interpretations, even if this declaration has no legal effect, its political, economic, and administrative impacts will not be easy, whether in terms of deepening divisions among Yemen’s elite and the public (North-South), preserving the legal standing of the Yemeni state, or even the continuity of managing the fragile state.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, its dangerous repercussions for the main battle to restore the state and relieve Yemenis from the consequences of a decade of war and state collapse.

Clearly, the Yemeni scene is becoming more complex, with events accelerating, positions erupting, and reactions escalating. No one knows precisely where developments in Yemen are headed.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Russia’s Defence Ministry had published a video of a downed drone it said Ukraine had launched at Putin’s residence, which Kyiv rejected.

United States President Donald Trump has dismissed claims that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s residence had been attacked by Ukraine as the war grinds on, saying he did not “believe that strike happened”, after having initially accepted the Kremlin’s version of events at face value.

On Sunday night, Trump, on board Air Force One, told reporters that “nobody knew at that moment” whether a report about the alleged incident was accurate. He added that “something” happened near Putin’s residence, but after US officials reviewed the evidence, they did not believe Ukraine targeted it.

Ukraine immediately denied its involvement, accusing Russia of a false-flag type operation to undermine peace negotiations. Moscow promptly said the incident would harden its peace talks stance.

Reports of the attack emerged last week after Russia’s Ministry of Defence published a video of a downed drone it said Kyiv had launched at Putin’s residence in the Novgorod region.

According to the ministry, the residence was not damaged, and Putin was elsewhere at the time.

Alongside Ukraine, its Western allies also heavily disputed that the attack had occurred at all.

The claim of the attack came as Russia and Ukraine work towards agreeing to a ceasefire deal to end the nearly four-year-long war.

European leaders are expected to meet in France on Tuesday for further talks on a US-backed ceasefire plan, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said was “90 percent ready”. Territorial issues over ceding land conquered in war or not remain at the heart of the matter.

First civilian deaths in Kyiv in 2026

Ukraine’s authorities reported on Monday morning that an overnight Russian attack on the Kyiv region had killed two people, in the first casualties in the capital in 2026.

According to the State Emergency Service of Ukraine, the Russian attack set a medical facility in the Obolonskyi district in Kyiv’s northern sector, where an inpatient ward was operating, on fire.

The service said once the fire was extinguished, a body was found inside. A woman was also injured, and 25 people were evacuated, the service added on Telegram.

Towns and villages across the Kyiv region were also damaged and critical infrastructure hit, leading to the killing of a man in his 70s in the Fastiv district, southwest of the capital, Governor Mykola Kalashnyk said on Telegram.

Kalashnyk added that small parts of the region were left without power.

Russia has not commented on the overnight strike yet.

It was his 26th birthday, so Wilmer Castro was not surprised by the flurry of messages that lit up his phone.

However, as he began scrolling on Saturday morning, he realised the messages were not birthday wishes, but news of something he had long hoped for: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro had been removed from power.

“I think it is the best gift that I will ever receive, one I will never forget,” the university student said from Ejido.

Castro told Al Jazeera that he was so elated by the news that he began daydreaming about his future self recounting the story of Maduro’s fall to his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

“I will tell them that on January 3, 2026, a dictator fell, and [that moment] is going to be very beautiful.”

The abduction of Venezuela’s long-time authoritarian leader – and his wife – by the United States followed months of escalating tensions between the two countries, including US strikes on alleged drug-trafficking vessels and the deployment of US ships near Venezuela’s coastal waters.

But by Sunday morning, Castro’s initial jubilation was clouded by a heavy quiet. The weight of uncertainty brought the city to a sombre pause, one that closed in on him and felt unlike anything he had experienced before.

“It’s like being in a field with nothing else around. It’s a mournful silence; I can’t describe it,” he said.

That uncertainty was felt by many Venezuelans on Sunday morning.

Venezuela has had a socialist government since 1999, first under President Hugo Chavez and later Maduro, a period that began with oil-funded social programmes but unravelled into economic mismanagement, corruption and repression – with international sanctions further squeezing the population.

Momentum around the 2024 presidential election raised hopes that the opposition alliance would take control. But when Maduro declared victory, despite opposition claims of a landslide win for Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, a crackdown on dissent followed. It left many Venezuelans concluding that any real transition might depend on pressure — or even intervention — from outside the country.

‘Deathly silence’

In southeastern Caracas on Saturday, 54-year-old Edward Ocariz was jolted awake by a loud crash and the vibrating windows of his home near the Fort Tiuna military barracks. He thought it was an earthquake, but when he looked outside, he saw unfamiliar helicopters flying low above smoke rising in the city.

“The noise kept coming,” he said. “I could immediately tell the helicopters were not Venezuelan because I had never seen them here.”

Then, just as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.

“There was a deathly silence,” Ocariz said, adding that the brief suspension of mobile phone services and power outages contributed to the silence. “We were waiting to understand what was happening.”

Fear accompanied the fragments of information that did manage to seep through, Ocariz said. “But it was a fear mixed with joy – tremendous joy. It’s hard to explain.”

On Sunday, when images of a blindfolded and handcuffed Maduro began circulating, Ocariz reflected on the suffering he had endured under the president’s regime.

The human rights activist said he was wrongfully charged with “terrorism” and spent nearly five months as a political prisoner in Tocuyito prison, a maximum-security facility in Carabobo state.

Under Maduro, the country had a long history of jailing those who dissent. After the disputed 2024 election, nearly 2,500 protesters, human rights activists, journalists and opposition figures were arrested. While some were later released, others remain behind bars.

“I felt satisfied. A process of justice is finally beginning,” Ocariz said, fully aware that Maduro will not have to endure the dire prison conditions he did, or be denied food and legal representation.

Despite the joy he and other Venezuelans now feel, Ocariz warns that much remains to be done.

“The population still feels a huge amount of fear [from the authorities] — psychological fear — because it’s well known how the police and justice system use their power to criminalise whoever they choose.”

So far, key institutions remain in the hands of figures from Nicolas Maduro’s inner circle, including Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, who has been named acting president.

But for many Venezuelans — including Castro and Ocariz — seeing a senior Chavista figure still in power is unsettling, particularly as the Trump administration continues to engage with her.

“It is certainly frustrating for me. However, I understand that Venezuela needs to continue with its administrative, functional, and operational management as a country, as a nation,” Ocariz said, adding that the US must maintain some order to control the power vacuum and stamp out repression.

Economic concerns

Venezuela remains heavily militarised, and fears of further unrest linger. During periods of dissent, the authorities relied not only on formal security forces but also on “colectivos”, armed civilian groups accused by rights organisations of intimidation and violence.

Jose Chalhoub, an energy and political risk analyst at Jose Parejo & Associates in Caracas, said he is concerned about the possibility of more attacks and social unrest.

“Any potential new government that will move ahead with the cleansing of the top ranks of the armed forces and security and police forces will lead to the disarmament of the colectivos,” he said, adding that fixing the lingering economic crisis should also be one of the main priorities.

“A new government that applies quick economic measures leading to a recovery will outshine the ideological legacy of the Bolivarian revolution,” he said, referring to the ideology of Chavismo, defined by anti-imperialism, patriotism and socialism.

Those loyal to Maduro have long blamed Venezuela’s economic woes on the US — namely, the sanctions it imposed on the oil sector.

Chalhoub said he believed Trump’s promise to boost the country’s oil production could help the economy, though he found the US president’s assertion that the US will “run the country” baffling.

However, not everyone is happy with the Trump administration’s attack.

Alex Rajoy, a mototaxi driver in Caracas, said the US president was on an imperialist crusade with the goal of “robbing” Venezuela of its natural resources.

Despite his anger, Rajoy said he will stay home over the coming days because he is fearful of further attacks.

“These missiles aren’t aimed only at Chavistas,” he said, referring to those loyal to Venezuela’s socialist ideology.

“They threaten opposition people, too,” he said, adding that anyone supporting foreign intervention amounts to a betrayal. “It’s treason against the homeland,” he said.

What now?

For Castro, the university student, the elation he felt on Saturday has been interrupted by fear for his immediate needs – concerns over whether stores would remain open in Ejido and rising costs. Under Maduro, he has long struggled to afford basic items.

“People in the street were going crazy yesterday,” he said. “Everyone was buying food with half of what they had in their bank accounts, buying what they could, because we don’t know what the future holds.”

The scenes brought back memories of the shortages of 2016, when hyperinflation and scarcity plunged the country into crisis, forcing people to queue for hours and rush between shops with limits on how much each person could buy.

But a day after the attack, Castro said Venezuelans are reflecting on the future of their country and the uncertainty of that future.

“There’s happiness, there’s fear, there’s gratitude, there’s the ‘what will happen next?’” he said. “For my next birthday, I want total freedom for Venezuela – and hopefully, God willing, we will have it.”

Caracas, January 4, 2025 (venezuelanalysis.com) – The governments of Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay, and Spain issued a joint statement Sunday rejecting “unilateral US actions in Venezuelan territory.”

“These actions contravene basic principles of international law and represent a very dangerous precedent for peace and regional security,” the communique read.

The joint statement followed widespread regional and global condemnation of Washington’s January 3 strikes against Venezuelan military sites and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores.

The countries went on to issue calls for dialogue and urged the United Nations secretary general and member states to help “de-escalate tensions and preserve peace.” 

In response to US President Donald Trump’s claim that he would “run” Venezuela, the signatories expressed concern over “attempts at foreign government control or seizure of natural resources.” However, the declaration made no mention of Maduro nor called for his release.

The diplomatic response to the US attacks also included an emergency summit of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean nations (CELAC), held on Sunday, January 4. Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yván Gil decried the US actions as blatant violations of international law and the United Nations Charter.

“The US has violated the personal immunity of a sitting head of state,” Gil told regional leaders in the conference call. “Kidnapping a president is kidnapping a people’s sovereignty.”

Venezuela’s top diplomat urged CELAC member-states to “take a step forward,” warning that silence would amount to acceptance of Washington’s unilateral acts.

A number of countries, including Venezuelan allies Russia and China, have forcefully denounced the US military operation. In a Sunday statement, Beijing charged Washington with a “clear violation of international law” and called for Maduro and Flores’ “immediate release.”

The UN Security Council is scheduled to hold an emergency session on Monday.

For her part, Venezuela Vice President and now acting Interim President Delcy Rodríguez reiterated demands for Maduro’s release and vowed that the country would not submit “to any empire.” Rodríguez held a press conference Saturday afternoon and confirmed the enactment of a decree establishing a “state of external commotion.” The instrument grants the executive additional tools, including the ability to mobilize troops or restrict civil liberties, for a period of 90 days that can be extended.

On Saturday night, the Venezuelan Supreme Court ruled that Maduro’s kidnapping and rendition to US soil constituted a temporary absence and that Rodríguez was mandated to take over the presidency on an interim basis.

Footage surfaced Saturday evening showing Maduro being walked out of an airplane in New York. He was later taken to a DEA facility before being moved, along with Flores, to the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. He made no statements but greeted DEA officers and appeared upbeat in photos, making a peace sign and holding his thumbs up.

The Venezuelan president was indicted by a New York district court on Saturday, with charges including “narcoterrorism conspiracy” and “possession of machine guns.” A hearing is reportedly scheduled for Monday.

For their part, Venezuela’s National BolivarianArmed Forces (FANB) likewise issued a communique on Sunday, rejecting the “cowardly kidnapping” of Maduro and Flores and reiterating its mission to “confront imperial aggression.”

The FANB voiced support for Rodríguez taking over the presidency on an acting basis and vowed to maintain readiness to preserve “peace and internal order.” 

The Defense Ministry has yet to provide a report on damages and casualties from the US strikes, though Sunday’s communiqué condemned the “cold-blooded murder” of members of Maduro’s security detail. Unconfirmed reports have put forward a figure of 80 deaths.

Venezuelan popular movements and political parties took to the streets for a second consecutive day on Sunday, holding marches and rallies in Caracas and other cities. Public transportation and retail functioned to a greater degree than on Saturday.

The US attacks also spurred numerous international solidarity demonstrations over the weekend. Crowds gathered in dozens of Latin American, European and US cities. A demonstration was called for Sunday outside the Brooklyn detention center where Maduro is being held.

The January 3 operation came on the heels of the largest ever US Caribbean military build-up, with Trump having previously ordered dozebs of strikes against small boats accused of carrying drugs, killing over 100 civilians. The US president has repeatedly expressed intentions of using military threats to extract favorable oil deals for US corporations.

In a Sunday interview, Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned the acting government in Caracas to “make the right decisions” and affirmed that the US retained “leverage” mechanisms, including a naval blockade stopping oil exports.

Israel claims the drone attack on a car targeted a Hezbollah member.

An Israeli drone attack on a car has killed two people in southern Lebanon, the Lebanese Ministry of Health has said.

Al Jazeera’s Ihab al-Aqdi, reporting from Lebanon, said the attack took place on Sunday in the Ayn al-Mizrab area north of the town of Bint Jbeil. He added that the targeted car was destroyed and that nearby buildings were damaged.

The Israeli military said the attack targeted a Hezbollah member, accusing the Lebanese group of not adhering to a ceasefire that began in November 2024.

Israel has repeatedly struck Lebanon since the ceasefire, despite the agreement, which ended a yearlong conflict that devastated Lebanon as well as Hezbollah’s leadership. Israel also continues to occupy five sites on the Lebanese side of the border.

Israeli attacks have killed more than 300 people in Lebanon since the ceasefire, including at least 127 civilians.

Israel, backed by the United States, expects Hezbollah to disarm. The Lebanese group has refused, however, leaving the Lebanese government and army in the difficult position of attempting to placate Israel and the US, while also avoiding a military confrontation with Hezbollah, which remains powerful despite the losses it has sustained at the hands of Israel.

The losses include the killing of its longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in September 2024, in an Israeli attack on Beirut.

The Lebanese government is expected to meet on Tuesday to discuss the army’s progress in disarming Hezbollah, beginning in southern Lebanon. It had previously set a deadline for the end of 2025 to do so, before continuing the disarmament process in the rest of the country. However, the plan has been dismissed by Hezbollah.

A ceasefire monitoring committee, including peacekeepers from Lebanon, Israel, France, the United States and the United Nations, is also set to meet in the upcoming week.

Highlighting Israel’s uncompromising position, the country’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, said that the Lebanese government’s efforts to disarm Hezbollah were “far from sufficient”, and that the group was aiming to rearm “with Iranian support”.

Kim Jong Un underscores the need to bolster Pyongyang nuclear deterrent, citing ‘recent geopolitical crisis’, state media reports.

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un has overseen the test flights of hypersonic missiles, underscoring the need to bolster the country’s nuclear deterrent amid “the recent geopolitical crisis” and “complicated international events,” according to state media.

The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) confirmed the drills on Monday, a day after North Korea’s neighbours said they detected multiple ballistic missile launches.

The tests came just hours before South Korean President Lee Jae Myung departed for China for a summit with President Xi Jinping.

The KCNA said that Sunday’s drill involving a hypersonic weapon system was meant to examine its readiness, enhance missile troops’ firepower operational skills and evaluate the operational capabilities of the country’s war deterrent.

“Through today’s launching drill, we can confirm that a very important technology task for national defence has been carried out,” Kim said, according to KCNA. “We must continuously upgrade the military means, especially offensive weapon systems.”

The missiles hit targets about 1,000km (621 miles) away, over the sea ‍east of ⁠North Korea, KCNA said.

Kim added that “it’s a very important ​strategy to maintain or expand the strong and reliable ‍nuclear deterrent”, because of “the recent geopolitical crisis and various international circumstances”.

The missile launch followed a North Korean statement on Sunday that denounced the attacks by the United States on Venezuela and its abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Pyongyang slammed the action as a “serious encroachment of sovereignty” and said it again showed “the rogue and brutal nature” of the US.

North Korea’s leadership has for decades justified its nuclear and missile programmes as a deterrent against alleged regime change efforts by Washington.

Hong Min, an expert on North Korea ‌at the Korea Institute for National Unification ⁠in Seoul, wrote in a note on Monday that Pyongyang’s latest test was an apparent response to the US strikes on Venezuela. The missile appears to be the Hwasong-11, which was showcased at a parade in October, Hong said, citing his analysis of images ‌published in state media reports.

Hong added that the Kim government is emphasising its ability to launch such missiles at any time, an ‍effort to complicate US-South Korea’s missile defence system and prevent its preemptive interception.

The possession of a functioning hypersonic weapon would give North Korea the ability to penetrate the US and South Korea’s missile defence shields. In past years, North Korea has performed a series of tests to acquire it, but many foreign experts question whether the tested missiles have achieved their desired speed and maneuverability during flights.

In recent weeks, North Korea has test-fired what it called long-range strategic cruise missiles and new anti-air missiles. It has also released photos showing apparent progress in the construction of its first nuclear-powered submarine.

Observers say North Korea aims to demonstrate or review its achievements in the weapons development sector ahead of the ruling Workers’ Party Congress, the first of its kind in five years. Keen attention is on whether Kim would use the congress to set a new approach to relations with the US and resume long-dormant talks.

Separately, North Korea’s nuclear programme is expected to be discussed when Lee and Xi meet for a summit later on Monday.

Lee’s office earlier said he would call for China, North Korea’s major ally and economic pipeline, to take “a constructive role” in efforts to promote peace on the Korean Peninsula.

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY,

US president says a military operation focused on Colombia’s government ‘sounds good’ to him.

United States President Donald Trump has threatened his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, in the wake of Washington’s abduction of Venezuela’s leader, and said he believed the government in Cuba, too, was likely to fall soon.

Trump made the comments late on Sunday while speaking to reporters on board Air Force One.

“Venezuela is very sick. Colombia is very sick too, run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States. And he’s not going to be doing it very long. Let me tell you,” the US president said.

When asked if he meant an operation by the US on Colombia, Trump said: “Sounds good to me.”

He added that a US military intervention in Cuba is unlikely because the country appears to be ready to fall on its own.

“Cuba is ready to fall. Cuba, looks like it’s ready to fall. I don’t know how they , if they can hold that, but Cuba now has no income. They got all of their income from Venezuela, from the Venezuelan oil,” Trump said.

“They’re not getting any of it. Cuba literally is ready to fall. And you have a lot of great Cuban Americans that are going to be very happy about this.”

Trump’s comments come a day after US forces captured and detained Maduro and his wife in a surprise attack on Caracas. The Venezuelan leader and his wife, Cilia Flores, are due to appear in court on drug-related charges in New York later on Monday.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Trump also insisted the US was ‘in charge’ of Venezuela, even though the country’s Supreme Court has appointed the country’s Vice President Delcy Rodriguez as interim leader.

He also reiterated a threat to send the US military back to Venezuela if it “doesn’t behave”.

Trump has made no secret of his ambitions to expand US presence in the Western hemisphere and revive the 19th century Monroe Doctrine that states Latin America falls under the US sphere of influence. Trump has called his 21st century version the “Don-roe Doctrine”.

The US president has also previously threatened both Colombia and Cuba. Over the weekend he said that Petro has to “watch his ass” and that the political situation in Cuba was “something we’ll end up talking about because Cuba is a failing nation”.

Denmark could become the latest customer of the P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, after the U.S. government approved the sale to the Scandinavian country and NATO member. The potential acquisition is of particular relevance when it comes to Denmark’s increasing focus on the defense of Greenland. However, it also underscores how an ‘alliance’ of P-8 operators is fast developing in the northern hemisphere, with growing possibilities for collaboration to maximize these aircraft’s effectiveness in a region of huge strategic importance.

The U.S. Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) announced U.S. Department of State approval for the potential deal on December 29. The estimated $1.8-billion Foreign Military Sales (FMS) acquisition covers three aircraft, as well as related equipment, training, support, and other items. Notably, it does not include weapons or sonobuoys.

In September 2025, Danish Minister of Defense Troels Lund Poulsen said that the government could invest “tens of billions of [Danish] kroner” in buying the P-8, highlighting official backing for the deal at the highest levels.

“I would prefer that we cooperate with other NATO countries to get the most for the money and to have a greater degree of flexibility. But if that is not possible, I am also willing for us to acquire the P-8 aircraft capacity ourselves, which can basically hunt submarines,” Poulsen added.

“The proposed sale will enhance Denmark’s capability to meet current and future threats by providing a credible force that is capable of deterring adversaries and participating in NATO operations,” the DSCA said in its announcement. “The proposed sale will support its goal of improving national and territorial defense as well as interoperability with U.S. and NATO forces.” While the deal still needs to be cleared by Congress before a contract can be signed, this would appear to be just a formality.

The proposed package also includes four examples each of the Multifunctional Distribution System Joint Tactical Radio System (MIDS JTRS) and the AN/AAQ-24(V)N Guardian anti-missile laser countermeasures system, plus eight LN-251 Embedded Global Positioning Systems/Inertial Navigation Systems. Denmark is additionally cleared to receive an undisclosed number of MX-20HD electro-optical and infrared systems, AN/AAQ-2(V) acoustic systems, AN/APY-10 maritime surveillance radars, and AN/ALQ-213 early warning management systems.

The ALQ-213 is notable in that it is a product of the Danish Terma company; it brings together the various items of aircraft survivability equipment on a given platform, coordinating between the various threat-warning and dispensing systems to automatically dispense the appropriate sequencing pattern and expendables to protect the aircraft, as outlined in the video below.

Electronic Warfare Management System for C-130J

In 2025, Boeing — the manufacturer of the P-8 — and Terma signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in 2025 to explore closer cooperation on the Poseidon program, including maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) support in Denmark. Potentially, Denmark could become home to an MRO hub that could service its own P-8s, as well as those of other customers.

The timelines for the construction and delivery of the aircraft were not announced.

For the Royal Danish Air Force (RDAF), the P-8 would provide an enormous leap in capability. Currently, it has no dedicated fixed-wing maritime patrol aircraft. Instead, it relies on three multirole Bombardier CL-604 Challenger bizjets that can be equipped with various sensors for maritime work. However, their lack of weapons and anti-submarine warfare kit means they are best suited to tasks such as fisheries protection, pollution control, and search and rescue.

The RDAF also has MH-60R Seahawk helicopters, which primarily operate from naval vessels.

For the RDAF, the main areas of maritime operation are in the North Atlantic Ocean around Greenland and the Faroe Islands, as well as in the Baltic Sea.

Denmark’s lack of true long-range maritime patrol capabilities is especially surprising considering the vast maritime areas involved. Not only are these part of the Danish Armed Forces’ key responsibilities in terms of homeland defense, but they are also regions of growing strategic importance, with heightened Russian naval activity in the North Atlantic and Arctic.

As well as a ramp-up in operations by the Russian Navy, especially involving submarines, with increasingly advanced capabilities, Greenland has also emerged as a potential flashpoint, something we have explored in depth in the past.

Greenland’s importance lies in its strategic location between North America and Russia. Though the island has a significant degree of autonomy, it remains part of the kingdom of Denmark. In recent years, there has been increased interest in the natural resources of this island, which is normally classified as the world’s biggest. The potential for mining for rare earth minerals, including uranium and iron, makes it a particular prize.

In terms of trade, Greenland lies on the shortest route from North America to Europe, further underlining its strategic importance to the United States.

Greenland has long been militarized, with the United States at the forefront of this throughout the Cold War, under an agreement with Denmark. Today, it still supports a U.S. radar base, which was transferred to the command of the U.S. Space Force in 2020.

U.S. President Donald Trump has highlighted the importance of the island to military efforts to track Chinese and Russian ships, which he said are “all over the place.” Trump has also repeatedly expressed his desire to acquire Greenland, describing the island as “critical” for national and economic security. In response, Greenland’s prime minister has said the territory is not for sale, adding that “Greenland belongs to the people of Greenland.”

Not surprisingly, Greenland has been central in Denmark’s Arctic Capability Package, first unveiled in 2021.

In October 2025, Denmark announced $4.2 billion of additional defense spending to cover the Arctic and North Atlantic regions, including Greenland. At the same time, it also said it would increase its F-35A fleet to 43, buying another 16 of the stealth jets at a cost of $4.5 billion.

The plan also includes buying two new Arctic ships, early warning radar, and maritime patrol planes. Denmark will also establish a new Arctic command headquarters in Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, alongside a new military unit under Joint Arctic Command in Greenland.

It would seem likely that the RDAF will station at least one P-8 in Greenland, if only on a rotational basis. This would parallel what it has done with one of its CL-604s since 2021, when it was announced that one of the jets would be based at Kangerlussuaq year-round to perform maritime surveillance.

Providing the deal is signed off, with the P-8, Denmark will be getting the heaviest and most powerful in-production maritime patrol aircraft on the market, rather than a smaller or cheaper solution.

As well as its performance advantage, the P-8 is also a true multi-mission platform. As well as weapons, it carries a range of sensors for use during anti-submarine warfare, anti-surface warfare, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), and search and rescue missions. Furthermore, even with its standard electronic support measures (ESM) suite, the P-8 can act in an electronic intelligence collection role, specifically on enemy air defenses and electronic order of battles. This is of relevance overland, as well as during maritime missions.

Its price tag is the main reason for the relatively small number of aircraft in the initial Danish package, although more could be added later.

The RDAF will also be able to expand the capabilities of its small P-8 fleet by using them in conjunction with its four MQ-9B SkyGuardian unmanned aerial systems, which were ordered in July 2025 and are due to be delivered between 2028 and 2029.

At the same time, Denmark will be joining a growing P-8 operators’ group that will be active in the region.

The United Kingdom has nine examples of the Poseidon MRA1 (equivalent to the P-8A) operational, while Norway has five P-8As.

Germany ordered eight P-8As, with the first of these being delivered in November 2025. Berlin has said these P-8s will be deployed periodically to RAF Lossiemouth in Scotland, where they will support the resident U.K. Royal Air Force Poseidon fleet of nine aircraft.

The United Kingdom and Norway have also discussed plans to cooperate on P-8 operations, and adding Denmark (and Germany) to this initiative would provide a major boost for NATO’s ability to effectively patrol the North Atlantic. This includes the strategically vital Greenland, Iceland, United Kingdom Gap, better known as the GIUK Gap, a critical bottleneck that is closely monitored. If Russian submarines can sneak through undetected, they have a much better chance of disappearing into the Atlantic without being traced. During a full-blown conflict, this would likely include wreaking havoc on NATO shipping and naval flotillas and executing pinpoint attacks on key land targets. While it is very much a multi-mission platform, this kind of mission remains central to the P-8’s existence.

Finally, Canada has 14 P-8As on order with an option for two more, with deliveries scheduled between 2026 and 2027. Canada is another country that has responded to the demands of a steadily more contested Arctic region by investing in maritime patrol and surveillance.

With this in mind, should Denmark’s P-8 deal be signed off, the Royal Danish Air Force will enjoy commonality with several regional partners, making it more straightforward to conduct joint operations, collaborate on training, and maximize interoperability and data exchange during operational missions. Aside from that, Denmark getting its hands on the Poseidon would be a huge deal for them, providing it with an aircraft capable of launching sizeable weapons, including anti-ship cruise missiles.

Whether Denmark gets the P-8 or opts for an alternative platform, the approval of the sale is another indicator of NATO’s growing focus on Arctic surveillance, via robust maritime patrol capabilities. For Denmark, buying the P-8 would also be a firm statement of its intent to protect the strategic waters surrounding Greenland.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

The Israeli military continues to demolish structures in northern Gaza while also blocking the entry of aid.

The Israeli army has launched more attacks into parts of Gaza outside its direct military control, despite the ceasefire deal mediated by the United States in October.

At least three Palestinians were killed on Sunday in separate Israeli attacks in Khan Younis, medical sources told Al Jazeera.

They included a 15-year-old boy, a fisherman, and a third man shot dead east of Khan Younis.

In the central part of the besieged enclave, Israeli fire injured several people east of the Bureij refugee camp.

In Gaza City to the north, Israeli forces continued to demolish homes and civilian infrastructure within the mostly destroyed Tuffah neighbourhood.

The Israeli army confirmed it was destroying more infrastructure in northern Gaza, but claimed that the target was “terrorist infrastructure above and below ground”, including tunnels in Beit Lahiya.

Israeli drones also dropped explosives on several homes in eastern Gaza City. The Shujayea and Zeitoun neighbourhoods of Gaza City, which have also been extensively attacked during more than two years of Israel’s genocidal war, were hit with artillery shelling.

At least 71,386 Palestinians have been killed and 171,264 others injured since the start of the war in October 2023, according to the latest figures from Gaza’s Ministry of Health. At least 420 people have been killed since the ceasefire was signed less than three months ago.

The Israeli military continues to block a large amount of the international humanitarian aid amassing at the border with Gaza, while maintaining that there is no shortage of aid despite testimonies by the United Nations and others working on the ground.

It has also moved to ban several prominent international aid groups from operating in Gaza, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and the Norwegian Refugee Council.

The US president’s latest threat comes a day after Washington bombed Venezuela and abducted its president.

Denmark’s prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, has ‍urged US President ‍Donald Trump to stop threatening to take over Greenland, after the latter reiterated his wish to do so following Washington’s abduction of the leader of Venezuela.

“It makes absolutely no sense to talk about the US needing ⁠to take over Greenland. The US has no right to annex any of ​the three countries in the Danish Kingdom,” Frederiksen said in ‍a statement on Sunday.

The comments followed an interview published by The Atlantic magazine, in which Trump said: “We do need Greenland, absolutely. We need it for defence.”

On Saturday, the United States bombed Venezuela and toppled President Nicolas Maduro, raising concerns in Denmark that the same could happen with Greenland, a Danish territory.

“I would therefore strongly urge the US to stop the threats against a historically close ally and against another country and another people who have very clearly said that they are not for sale,” Frederiksen said.

The Greenlandic prime minister’s office did not ​immediately comment on Trump’s latest remarks.

The US president has repeatedly called for Greenland, a self-governing Danish territory and NATO member, to become part of the US.

Last month, the Trump administration named Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry, who publicly supports annexation, as special envoy to the mineral-rich Arctic Island.

Greenland’s strategic position between Europe and ⁠North America makes it a key site for the US ballistic missile defence system, and its mineral wealth is attractive, as the US hopes to reduce its reliance on Chinese exports.

Katie Miller, the wife of Trump’s deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, posted on Saturday the contentious image of the Danish autonomous territory in the colours of the US flag on her X feed.

Her post had a single word above it: “SOON”.

Stephen Miller is widely seen as the architect of much of Trump’s policies, guiding the president on his hardline immigration and domestic agenda.

Greenland’s prime minister, Jens-Frederik Nielsen, called the post “disrespectful”.

“Relations between nations and peoples are built on mutual respect and international law – not on symbolic gestures that disregard our status and our rights,” he said on X.

But he also said that “there is neither reason for panic nor for concern. Our country is not for sale, and our future is not decided by social media posts”.

Denmark’s ambassador to the US, Jesper Moeller Soerensen, reacted to the post on Sunday by saying, “We expect full respect for the territorial integrity” of Denmark.

Soerensen gave a pointed “friendly reminder” that his country has “significantly boosted its Arctic security efforts” and had worked with the US on that.

“We are close allies, and should continue to work together as such,” he wrote.

Liam Rosenior has flown to London to finalise his expected appointment as Chelsea head coach.

As BBC Sport reported on Thursday, Strasbourg boss Rosenior is the leading candidate to replace Enzo Maresca, who has left Stamford Bridge.

Talks to appoint Rosenior are at an advanced stage, and the 41-year-old is in the capital to complete formalities before he is named as Maresca’s successor.

BlueCo – the investment vehicle set up to purchase Chelsea in 2022 – has started the process of identifying candidates to replace Rosenior at sister club Strasbourg.

Chelsea caretaker manager Calum McFarlane says “there’s a chance” the new boss will be in place on Monday.

The under-21s coach stepped in after Maresca parted company with Chelsea following disagreements with leadership figures at the club.

McFarlane’s Chelsea drew 1-1 away at title challengers Manchester City on Sunday thanks to an equaliser in the closing moments from midfielder Enzo Fernandez.

Speaking after the match, McFarlane said: “When I first took the job, I was told I would take the Manchester City game. So that was three days with the group.

“There’s a chance the new manager will be in on Monday – that’s what I was told originally.

“Obviously, it’s Sunday now. We’ve been solely focused on the game. I’m sure I’ll get more information once I’m out of this press conference. But as far as I know, the new manager will be in shortly and I’ll lead the team until he’s in.”

The United States’ abduction of Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro has been sharply criticised by his allies – but not by Western nations, despite questions about its legality.

So, does the operation signal a new aggressive US strategy? And what might the global impact be?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests:

Charles Shapiro – Former US ambassador to Venezuela under President George W Bush

Stefan Wolff – Professor of International Security at the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom

Ernesto Castaneda – Director of the Center for Latin American and Latino Studies at the American University in Washington, DC

In less than 24 hours, the US bombed Venezuela, brazenly abducted President Nicolas Maduro and his wife from their compound in Caracas and whisked them to a detention centre in New York. Here’s how regime change unfolded overnight.

A deal penned in March stipulated that the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) would integrate with state institutions by the end of the year, but its implementation has since stalled.

Syrian government officials have held talks with the commander of the main Kurdish-led force in the country over plans to merge it with the national army, state media reported, adding that no “tangible results” had been achieved.

The Kurdish-led and US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said in a statement on Sunday that a delegation led by top commander Mazloum Abdi (also known as Mazloum Kobani) held talks with government officials in Damascus related to the military integration process.

A major sticking point has been whether the SDF would remain a cohesive unit in the new army or whether it would be dissolved and its members individually absorbed. The group has tens of thousands of fighters and is the main force yet to be absorbed into Syria’s military.

State TV said the meeting did not produce “tangible results” and that the sides agreed to hold further meetings at a later date.

The leadership in Damascus under President Ahmed al-Sharaa inked a deal in March with the SDF, which controls large swathes of Syria’s oil-rich north and northeast. The Kurdish-led force was to merge with the Syrian army by the end of 2025, but there have been disagreements on how it would happen.

The deal also would bring all border crossings with Iraq and Turkiye, as well as airports and oil fields in the northeast, under the central government’s control. Prisons holding about 9,000 suspected members of the ISIL (ISIS) group are also expected to come under government control.

Turkiye considers the SDF a “terrorist” organisation because of its association with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which has waged a decades-long armed conflict on its soil, although a peace process is now under way.

Ankara sees the presence of Kurdish forces on its border as a security threat and has publicly called for them to be integrated into the state, but not as a single unit.

The SDF insists on a decentralised system of governance that would allow it to maintain its influence in the areas it controls. Tensions between the SDF and the government – which opposes calls for decentralisation – have occasionally led to violence.

In late December, clashes broke out between security forces and SDF fighters in the northern city of Aleppo during a visit to Syria by Turkiye’s Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.

Last month, Fidan urged the SDF to not be an obstacle to Syria’s stability and warned that patience with the group was running out.

Evidence that the United States employed AGM-114 Hellfire or AGM-179A Joint Air-to-Ground Missiles (JAGM) in a covert strike on a target in Venezuela has now emerged. The U.S. military also recently disclosed an attack on what it says was a trio of drug-smuggling boats sailing in a convoy. Just earlier this week, TWZ highlighted exactly these potential scenarios in the broader context of recent sightings of U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drones flying over the Caribbean with unusually heavy weapons loads.

Spanish-language television network Telemundo, headquartered in Miami, Florida, first broadcast imagery of U.S. missile fragments, which we will come back to in a moment, that it said were recovered in Venezuela’s far northwestern Alta Guajira region. What looks to be the full video clip that those images were taken from is also now circulating online. NBC News had previously reported that members of Venezuela’s Wayuu indigenous community had witnessed a mysterious explosion in Alta Guajira on December 18. U.S. President Donald Trump had first disclosed that the U.S. government had carried out a covert U.S. strike on Venezuelan soil on December 26, but it remains unconfirmed exactly where or when that occurred. Other details, including that the operation targeted a “port facility” or “dock” and that it was carried out by a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) drone, have been reported since then, as you can read more about here.

Returning to the missile fragments reportedly found in Alta Guajira, they are relatively small, but have distinctive “WARNING” and “52.0” markings that are clearly visible. This is fully consistent with the markings seen on AGM-179A Joint Air-to-Ground Missiles (JAGM), as well as some variants of the AGM-114 Hellfire. Similar fragments have been seen on many occasions following confirmed and reported U.S. drone strikes around the world, including ones tied to the CIA and the U.S. military’s secretive Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).

The AGM-179A is derived directly from the AGM-114R variant, and both missiles share an identical rear body. JAGM’s main area of improvement over its predecessor is its new dual-mode seeker, with laser and millimeter-wave radar guidance modes, which gives it more flexibility to engage targets, as you can read more about here. Every JAGM and Hellfire has a label at the tail end that says “WARNING” and “2-MAN LIFT,” and lists their weight in kilograms and pounds. Each JAGM is roughly 115 pounds (52 kilograms). The stated weight of the baseline R model Hellfire is approximately 110 pounds (49 kilograms). However, there are many subvariants of the AGM-114R, some of which have very different configurations from the standard type. This includes the R9X version, which features an array of pop-out sword-like blades instead of a traditional high-explosive warhead.

MQ-9s armed with AGM-114s have been flying from Rafael Hernandez Airport in Aguadilla in Puerto Rico since September 2025, ostensibly in support of expanded counter-drug operations in the Caribbean. Starting last month, local spotters noticed Reapers operating from the airport carrying steadily larger loads of Hellfires, up to as many as 10 at a time. The drones have not been seen with JAGMs, or any other munitions, under their wings. The U.S. military still does not appear to have officially confirmed the integration of JAGM onto the MQ-9, but adding the missiles to the Reaper’s arsenal is at least planned, and there has been evidence in the past that it has already occurred.