Venezuela: Trump to meet elite troops behind Maduro ’s capture

Trump

United States President Donald Trump will meet on Friday with the special forces soldiers who captured Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in a deadly raid in Caracas in January.

First Lady Melania Trump will accompany her husband for the trip to greet the troops at the Fort Bragg military base in North Carolina, the White House said.

The stunning operation saw US forces swoop in by helicopter under cover of darkness and seize Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores from a highly secured compound in the Venezuelan capital on January 3.

Eighty-three people were killed and more than 112 people were injured in the assault, which began with US bombing raids on Venezuelan military targets, Venezuelan officials said.

No US service members were killed.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump and the first lady would “meet with military families and the heroic members of our special forces who carried out the successful ‘Operation Absolute Resolve’ in Venezuela and helped bring narco-terrorist Nicolas Maduro to justice.”

Maduro is currently in detention in the United States facing charges of drug trafficking and other crimes, to which he has pleaded not guilty. His next court hearing is scheduled for March 17 in New York. Punch