Caracas. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro received a march of the Venezuelan peasant movement at Miraflores Palace to protest the US military threat and the killings of fishermen in the Caribbean. Addressing the crowd, he affirmed that the Bolivarian Republic would never be colonized by any empire. “Enough of endless wars and imperial massacres!” he exclaimed.
Furthermore, he asserted that"times of Gran Colombian unity are approaching," referring to the nation founded by Simón Bolívar two centuries ago that included present-day Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, and Panama.
Maduro's comments come amid repeated direct threats from US President Donald Trump against both Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and Colombian President Gustavo Petro, as well as against their respective countries, announcing possible ground attacks that could occur"very soon." Trump accuses Colombia and Venezuela of sending drugs into the United States.
“I know it, I feel it in my heart that the times to come are for the union of Venezuela and Colombia (…) sooner rather than later we have to refound Gran Colombia,” he said.
Maduro also expressed his gratitude for the demonstrations held in Oslo, Norway, in protest against the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to María Corina Machado, a leader of the Venezuelan far-right opposition, who has been criticized for systematically promoting foreign aggression against her own country. “The most impressive thing was the massive march of the people of Oslo who came out shouting, ‘No to war for oil!’” he stated.
He also expressed his gratitude for the more than 65 marches that took place over the weekend in the United States rejecting Trump's war against Venezuela.
Guyana's cooperation with the US
For her part, Vice President Delcy Rodríguez rejected the claim that Guyana had signed a letter of intent to expand military cooperation with the United States.
“Two hundred years later, Monroe’s agents are recruiting subservient politicians to serve US national interests. They betray their own people for a slap on the wrist,” Rodríguez wrote on social media. He added that Irfaan Ali, the Guyanese president, intends to hand over “the stolen loot (Venezuelan oil) to the expansionist imperialists, beating the drums of war.”
Venezuela and Guyana share a border of more than 789 kilometers in a disputed area that Caracas claims as its own and is currently administered by Georgestown.
According to a statement from the Guyanese president's office, the document signed on Tuesday reaffirms the"longstanding security partnership" between the two countries and is part of the US strategy called Southern Spear, whose objective, according to the Guyanese press release, is to expand military alliances in the Western Hemisphere and strengthen commitment to CARICOM nations.
Operation Southern Spear has been responsible for over 80 extrajudicial killings in recent months, as classified by international human rights experts endorsed by the United Nations (UN). These killings have involved attacks on small boats in international waters of the Caribbean, accusing their crews of attempting to smuggle drugs to the United States. Additionally, Southern Spear involves the deployment of more than 15,000 troops to the region and a contingent of a dozen warships, including the aircraft carrier Gerald Ford, the largest and most modern in the world. Venezuela has denounced this deployment as a threat of war and has prepared to defend its sovereignty. Statements from White House spokespeople support this claim, accusing the Venezuelan government of being a drug cartel and declaring it a terrorist organization. Donald Trump himself stated this week during an interview that"Maduro's days are numbered."
The Venezuelan oil “loot”
The Trump administration makes no secret of its interest in Venezuela's vast oil reserves, which Caracas reiterates are the true reason for Washington's escalating military aggression against the Caribbean nation. It is important to note that Venezuela has approximately 303.8 billion barrels of certified crude oil reserves beneath its soil, representing the largest oil reserves in the world, surpassing Saudi Arabia's estimated 266 billion barrels.
These reserves guarantee Venezuela's oil supply for more than a century at the current production rate. Production reported by PDVSA, the Venezuelan state oil company, for the third quarter of 2025 is 1.1 million barrels per day. Of this amount, Venezuela exports approximately 950 million barrels.
Venezuelan crude is particularly compatible with US refineries in the Gulf of Mexico, and this volume of reserves represents a guaranteed energy supply for the United States for several decades. Therefore, Operation Southern Spear—declared as a counter-narcotics effort—is seen as an attempt to seize Venezuelan oil through regime change.
