RPT - Threat Of US Intervention Remains, Caracas Has Proof Of Possible New Attacks - Ambassador

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 25th December, 2019) The threat of the United States' intervention in Venezuela remains real, and Caracas has proof suggesting that more attacks on its military facilities are being prepared, Carlos Rafael Faria Tortosa, the Latin American country's ambassador to Russia, told Sputnik.

"This lull is relative; maybe it's due to the fact that [US] Secretary of State [Mike] Pompeo and President [Donald] Trump do not talk that much about Venezuela now; they do talk about it but not as much as they did before. The threat remains," the ambassador said.

When asked if Caracas had information on whether attacks against his country were being planned, the diplomat said the authorities expected them to happen.

"We can expect them, yes. We can prove it. President [Nicolas] Maduro is constantly working together with our defense forces. He meets with the commanders in chief, studies the situation and ways to better organize the defense. And we have information that there can always be aggression, attacks from any direction," the ambassador argued.

Venezuela knows that US officials are waiting for a pretext to engage in aggressive actions against Caracas, according to the diplomat.

The ambassador also said that the Venezuelan opposition's recent deadly attack on a military unit in the country's south did not achieve everything it sought out to.

"Colombia is an unfriendly country to us. Brazil is unfriendly now too � there are our neighbors [located] in the Caribbean Sea as well. All the islands located close to [Venezuela] are former colonies and some continue to be the colonies of the Netherlands, of the United Kingdom. So things are not easy for our country now. But we can say that by the end of this year, there are more positive than negative things," the diplomat added.

According to Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, the attack on the military unit led to one soldier being killed and weapons being stolen from the facility.