Global Research

The US and its long-time Puppet state, Colombia are moving towards another attempt for regime change against Venezuela’s President, Nicolas Maduro.  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s Latin American tour which included Colombia, Brazil, Guyana and Suriname, all share borders Venezuela was a display of the US flaunting its economic and military muscle to shape its Latin America policy for its economic and geopolitical advantage in the region. 

Pompeo’s press statement with Colombia’s President Ivan Duque began with

“The United States remains the largest single donor of humanitarian and development assistance around the world, including for Venezuelans in need, because doing our part to respond to global crisis situations is a national security priority.” 

There were two main issues they both agreed upon and that was to deepen ties economically with Pompeo promising more US investments in Colombia and to overthrow their common enemy, Nicolas Maduro.  Pompeo mentioned Colombia’s support behind Juan Guaido and the nations who influence the Maduro government including Cuba, Iran and Russia,

“Colombia’s backing of opposition leader Juan Guaido “and the democratic transition for a sovereign Venezuela free of malign influence from Cuba, from Russia, from Iran, is incredibly valued.”

Pompeo praised Colombia’s lapdog President by claiming that “You are a true leader for the region and the dignity of all of its people.”  Colombia’s President Ivan Duque has continued the same human rights violations from previous US supported regimes according to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) who released a statement on the matter in early January of this year:

We are deeply troubled by the staggering number of human rights defenders killed in Colombia during 2019. According to our records, 107 activists were killed last year, and our staff in Colombia are still in the process of verifying 13 additional cases reported during 2019 which, if confirmed, would raise the annual total to 120 killings. Attacks on human rights defenders had already intensified during 2018, when 115 killings were confirmed by the UN Human Rights Office in Colombia. And this terrible trend is showing no let-up in 2020, with at least 10 human rights defenders already reportedly killed during the first 13 days of January.

We renew our call on the Colombian Government to make a strenuous effort to prevent attacks on people defending fundamental rights, to investigate each and every case and to prosecute those responsible for these violations, including instigating or aiding and abetting violations. The vicious and endemic cycle of violence and impunity must stop. Victims and their families have a right to justice, truth and reparations.

The great majority of the 107 killings in 2019, happened in rural areas, almost all (98 %) in municipalities with illicit economies where criminal groups or armed groups operate, and 86 % of the total number took place in villages with a poverty rate above the national average. While more than half of the killings occurred in just four provinces — Antioquia, Arauca, Cauca and Caquetá — murders were nevertheless recorded in 25 different provinces. The single most targeted group was human rights defenders advocating on behalf of community-based and specific ethnic groups such as indigenous peoples and Afro-Colombians. The killings of female human rights defenders increased by almost 50 per cent in 2019 compared to 2018

Following his meeting with the Colombian president, Pompeo’s press statement signaled that the US will fund $348 million for “humanitarian assistance” which really means a “humanitarian intervention” in neighboring Venezuela:

The United States is demonstrating our continued commitment to the Venezuelan people and our response to the ongoing humanitarian crisis caused by the corrupt and illegitimate Maduro regime with the announcement of an additional nearly $348 million in humanitarian assistance.

This amount includes nearly $143 million from the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, and more than $205 million from the U.S. Agency for International Development

Washington is interested in Venezuela’s oil, they want a lapdog government under someone like Juan Guaido who Trump called “Venezuela’s true and legitimate president” in a State of the Union speech last February.  Trump visited South Florida in early July for a meeting with the U.S Military Southern Command and said that “something will happen with Venezuela. That’s all I can tell you” and that Washington “will be very much involved.”  Trump’s former National Security Advisor John Bolton, who is a neocon relic from the 1980′s told Fox News before he was fired that “we’re in conversation with major American companies now… It will make a big difference to the US economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela.”  Controlling Venezuela’s oil is Washington’s priority in South America, not for the humanitarian causes as Trump’s top neocon warmonger Mike Pompeo has claimed.  Pompeo emphasized on the continued success of Colombia’s ‘War on Drugs’or what he called “the poison of narcotics”, he said that

“our two countries are also standing strongly against the poison of narcotics.  Mr. President, your administration has been exemplary in this area.  Colombian law enforcement, even in these difficult times, has stepped up cocaine interdiction and eradication.  You manually cleared 57% more coca fields in 2019 than in the year prior, 2018.  Look, we all need to do more to reach the goal to cut this coca cultivation.  I know you’ll do that.  The U.S. is here to help by sharing resources, expertise, and we applaud the work that you have done.  Thank you for that.” 

Duque thanked Pompeo in response

“I think that, Mr. Secretary, we had a wonderful meeting, and I thank you once again for visiting our country, for being here.  And as we said repeatedly in the past, the U.S.-Colombia relationship is strengthened every day.  And you have said so – Colombia represents our most important ally in Latin America – and we feel the same.  And we do so because we share common values and we will continue to share and strengthen those values throughout our history.  So my gratitude to you and to President Trump.  Thank you so much.”

Hugo Chávez, the late Venezuelan President once said that

“Unfortunately, Colombia is, strategically, the beachhead for Yankee strivings in South America, their base of operations. [They] send elite troops under a drug-war façade. So Colombia is a country occupied by foreign troops that has yet to stop the production and trafficking of drugs.”

Indeed, Colombia is the main staging ground for any future US-led invasion against Venezuela who holds more oil than any of their South American counterparts.  The stage is set with the US and Colombia in an attempt to remove Maduro from power with either a coup attempt by the opposition or with a full US-led invasion.  However, if Washington were to launch a conflict with Venezuela, it would be most likely after the elections and if of course, Trump wins in November.  However, removing Maduro from power by force will be a difficult task to do since he has full-support of the Venezuelan military and the people who will be the core of the resistance.  Russia and China also back Maduro.  If the US were to achieve their goals of regime change, Big Oil would reap the benefits and Trump would keep another promise that he will surely brag about to his Latino base in South Florida made-up of right-wing Cuban exiles, Venezuelans and other Latino groups who support US efforts to overthrow the Venezuelan, Cuban and the Nicaraguan governments.  Trump’s first-term in office was relatively peaceful because he did not approve a conventional war, but in his second-term, he won’t be so-peaceful because he won’t owe the public anything, if of course he wins a second-term.

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Timothy Alexander Guzman writes on his blog site, Silent Crow News, where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from SCN