U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau responded on Aug. 18 to Venezuelan Minister of Interior and Justice Diosdado Cabello’s recent accusations against him and the U.S. chargé d’affaires in Colombia, John McNamara, regarding alleged actions against Colombia and Venezuela.
Cabello spoke on Venezuelan national television on Aug. 13 about McNamara, accusing him of “openly conspiring” against Colombian President Gustavo Petro and Venezuela. He also claimed Landau and McNamara were “the new accusers” of Venezuela.
“You and your gang of brutal criminals have destroyed your homeland as rarely in human history has a great country been destroyed,” Landau wrote in a post on X in response to Cabello’s television broadcast.
Landau also addressed the state of the South American nation following the controversial electoral process that has kept Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in power and the massive exodus of Venezuelans out of the country.
“Last year’s elections and the tsunami of migration abroad clearly demonstrate to the entire world the absolute repudiation of its own people,” Landau said.
“You who think you are so clever have fooled no one. You are the ones who have harassed and declared war on the great people of Venezuela.”
Landau warned Diosdado that “history shows how tyrants end.”
Venezuela is in the midst of a political and human rights crisis that intensified on July 29, 2024—one day after the presidential elections—after the National Electoral Council (CNE) officially declared Maduro the winner for a third consecutive term, without publishing supporting records and in a widely criticized process.
Several international organizations, such as the OAS and Human Rights Watch, have issued reports evidencing arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, torture, and other crimes inflicted by the current Maduro-led government against members of the opposition and Venezuelan citizens.
Since 2018, nearly 7 million Venezuelans have fled the country, according to the Interagency Coordination Platform for Refugees and Migrants.
Landau previously stated, in an interview with Donald Trump Jr. on his “Triggered” program on Aug. 11, that the United States can take further action against Maduro—on whom the Trump administration has placed a $50 million bounty—but that ultimately it is the Venezuelan people who must act and demand his freedom.
“We can certainly try to take actions to defend our interest and try to create conditions for the people in various countries to take appropriate actions,” Landau told Trump Jr.
“I mean, I think one of the problems we’ve seen in the world is that, if people don’t earn their own freedom, they don’t appreciate it. We can’t go around the world changing governments at our whim.”
Landau visited Colombia last week—along with Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) and McNamara—as a special envoy for the Trump administration, to attend the funeral services for Senator and presidential candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, who died on Aug. 11, after more than two months in the hospital following an attempt on his life.
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