“The last thing we want is for South America to become a war zone, which would inevitably lead not only to a conflict between the United States and Venezuela, but to global involvement. That would be truly unfortunate,” said first-term Foreign Minister Celso Amorim Lula da Silva and his current special adviser on international policy.
“I know South America… our entire continent exists thanks to resistance against foreign invaders,” Amorim said, and any U.S. attack would reignite anti-American sentiment in Latin America.
In an interview with GuardianThe diplomat described Donald Trump’s recent decision to order the closure of Venezuelan airspace as an “act of war” and expressed fears that the crisis will worsen in the coming weeks.
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For the presidential adviser, a real invasion “would undoubtedly look similar to Vietnam.” Since last August, the White House has massed more than a dozen warships and about 15,000 military personnel off the coast of Venezuela as part of its Operation Southern Spear.
Actually, launched the largest naval operation in the Caribbean since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Worse, it carried out a series of deadly airstrikes against suspected drug ships, killing more than 80 people.
In addition to the huge military contingent that Washington has assembled outside Caracas, claiming that Maduro is an illegitimate ruler with ties to the cartels, Trump has authorized the CIA to conduct deadly covert operations in the region.
According to United States Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, “Every trafficker we kill has ties to a terrorist organization.”. And for this reason, “these high-impact attacks should be intentionally lethal.”
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The official also questioned the American newspaper “Washington Post” because it said that the minister had ordered military units in early September to “kill everyone” on the alleged drug trafficking ships in the Caribbean. However, such actions have become so suspicious that senior members of the Senate Armed Services Committee have said they will investigate these incidents as part of Operation Southern Lance, which is said to be aimed at narco-terrorists.
Amorim, President Lula’s adviser, emphasized that his government was strictly against any forced regime change. The question was about the last elections that gave victory to the Venezuelan head of state, a victory that many countries, including Brazil, questioned. But despite this recognition of the doubts about the veracity of the results of these elections, the diplomat became forceful: “If every dubious election triggered an invasion, the world would be on fire.”
For Amorim, whose comments to the Guardian were “personal,” “Maduro will come to the conclusion that the best thing for him and Venezuela is to leave power, that will be his conclusion. But Brazil will never enforce it; it will never say that it is a requirement. We will not pressure Maduro to resign or abdicate.”
Asked whether Brazil could be an option for political asylum, the former chancellor indicated that he preferred not to speculate “to give the impression that he is not promoting the idea.” However, he clarified that “asylum is a Latin American institution for people of the right and left” and recalled that the Ecuadorian Lucio Gutiérrez had found refuge in Brazil after his ouster as president in 2005: “We even sent a plane to pick him up.”
According to international media There has been speculation about Maduro’s possible fate if he leaves power. Cuba, Turkey, Qatar and Russia were also mentioned as travel destinations.
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