Mexico and Brazil both offered to mediate between the US and Venezuela as President Donald Trump’s tanker blockade increases tension between the two nations.
“We can always act as a negotiating point if the parties want,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Wednesday, during her daily press conference. “They would have to propose this to us and, if not, they would have to seek mediators who can help avoid any conflict in the region.”
Hours later, Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva also offered to act as peacemaker.
“I told Trump that if he’s interested in talking with Venezuela properly, we can help,” Lula said, in a televised cabinet meeting. “I am concerned about Latin America. I am concerned about President Trump’s actions toward Latin America, about the threats.”
On Tuesday, Trump ordered a blockade of sanctioned oil tankers entering and leaving Venezuelan ports, ratcheting up pressure on the government of Nicolás Maduro as the US builds up its military in the region.
“Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the history of South America,” Trump wrote on social media Tuesday. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before.”
Sheinbaum also said that the United Nations needs to help seek a peaceful solution of the dispute. She said she hasn’t spoken with Maduro.
Blockades aimed at governments tend to hurt the civilian population instead, Sheinbaum said, citing US policy toward Cuba as an example.
Last week, the US seized a sanctioned oil tanker off Venezuela’s coast. The Pentagon has also conducted dozens of strikes against purported drug-trafficking vessels in waters near Venezuela and Colombia, while Trump has suggested that the US could also strike targets on land.
With assistance from Carolina Millan and Daniel Carvalho.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
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