Trump claims US has captured Venezuelan dictator and wife

Trump claims US has captured Venezuelan dictator and wife

Tom Phillips in Rio de Janeiro

Sat, January 3, 2026 at 9:39 AM UTC

4 min read

<span>Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores have been captured and flown out of Venezuela according to Donald Trump.</span><span>Photograph: Miraflores Palace/Reuters</span> — Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores have been captured and flown out of Venezuela according to Donald Trump.Photograph: Miraflores Palace/Reuters

Donald Trump has claimed the US has “captured” Venezuela’s dictator, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flown them out of the South American country after a pre-dawn assault on Caracas and the surrounding region.

“This operation was done in conjunction with US law enforcement. Details to follow,” the US president wrote on social media on Saturday morning after eyewitnesses in Venezuela reported a series of explosions.

Shortly before, Venezuela’s government accused the US of launching a series of attacks against civilian and military targets in the South American country, after explosions rocked its capital, Caracas, before dawn on Saturday.

In a statement, Venezuela’s government urged citizens to rise up against the assault and said Washington risked plunging Latin America into chaos with “an extremely serious” act of “military aggression”.

“The entire country must mobilise to defeat this imperialist aggression,” it added.

US media reported that Trump had ordered the strikes against the South American country.

Explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas in the early hours of Saturday. In its statement, Venezuela’s government confirmed that the city had come under attack, as well as three other states: Miranda, La Guaira and Aragua.

“The only objective of this attack is to seize control of Venezuela’s strategic resources, in particular its oil and minerals,” it said, calling on the international community to denounce what it called a flagrant violation of international law that put millions of lives at risk.

The president of neighbouring Colombia, Gustavo Petro, claimed on social media that Venezuela was coming under attack. “Right now they are bombing Caracas … bombing it with missiles,” Petro wrote on X, calling for an immediate emergency session of the UN security council.

Soon after CBS News reported that Trump had had ordered the attacks – including on military facilities. The White House and Pentagon did not respond to request for comment.

At least seven explosions were heard about 2am local time and people in various neighbourhoods rushed to the street, the Associated Press reported. “The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes in the distance,” said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker.

Eyewitnesses reported seeing smoke pouring from two key military installations in Caracas: the La Carlota military airfield at the heart of the city and the Fuerte Tiuna military base where Venezuela’s authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro, has long been thought to live. Another important airport to the east of Caracas, Higuerote, also appeared to come under attack.

The explosions come after a five-month US pressure campaign against Maduro, which many analysts believe is designed to topple the Venezuelan leader. Since August, Donald Trump has ordered a massive military buildup off Venezuela’s northern coast and conducted a series of deadly airstrikes on supposed “narco boats”.

Trump has repeatedly promised land operations in Venezuela, amid efforts to pressure Maduro to leave office, including expanded sanctions, a ramped-up US military presence in the region and more than two dozen strikes on vessels allegedly involved in trafficking drugs in the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea.

The US has also seized sanctioned oil tankers off the coast of Venezuela, and Trump ordered a blockade of others in a move that seemed designed to put a tighter chokehold on the South American country’s economy.

Colombia’s president Petro published what he claimed was a partial list of the bombed installations in Venezuela, including the 19th-century national assembly building in Caracas; La Carlota, the most important air base within the capital; and an air force base in the city of Barquisimeto.

The reputedly targeted sites also included the Cuartel de la Montaña barracks in Caracas, a military base that is home to the mausoleum of Maduro’s mentor, Hugo Chávez. The mausoleum is one of the most sacred locations for their political movement, Chavismo, which has governed Venezuela in an increasingly authoritarian fashion since Chávez first came to power in 1999. Chávez’s remains were taken to the barracks and put on public display after he died of cancer in 2013.

The president of Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel, denounced the US’s “criminal attack” and claimed the region was being brutally assaulted. “[This is] state terrorism against the gallant people of Venezuela and against Our America,” wrote Díaz-Canel who is Maduro’s main regional ally.

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