– SALE VENEZUELA – Archive
MADRID, December 12 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The US special forces veteran who helped Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado leave Venezuela has ruled out US President Donald Trump hiring him and assured that Washington “hasn’t invested a single cent in it”.
The former soldier, identified as Bryan Stern and president of the Gray Bull Rescue Foundation, assured that the operation had been financed by “certain donors”, but stressed that “none of them were senior American officials”. “The United States government has not contributed, at least to my knowledge,” he said in an interview with CBS television.
However, he clarified that his own organization worked “unofficially” with the US military to develop plans and “avoid detection”, although he did not give details of Machado’s possible passage through Curaçao before flying to Oslo, the Norwegian capital.
Thus, he explained, the opponent, who ultimately did not arrive in time to collect the Nobel Peace Prize, was first transferred to a meeting point on the high seas, where Stern received her before heading to a location that he did not want to reveal.
“I did not meet her in Curaçao, but in another place very far from there. Extremely far,” he noted, while specifying that “the moment when she got on the boat was the most dangerous of the whole operation”. “She is the only Nobel Peace Prize winner to have been subject to such a situation,” he said.
Additionally, he explained that dozens of people were directly involved in the planning process, which required intelligence, translation and logistics services. Stern and his company were in charge of the land and sea operation, as well as its extraction, matters which were “planned over four days”, as he clarified.
In total, he claimed, it took nearly 16 hours of “rescue” until “she made her way safely to Norway to collect the Nobel Prize and reunite with her family.” “Much of this period was spent at sea, where he did not enjoy the voyage due to poor weather conditions,” he continued.
“It was dangerous, it was scary. The sea conditions were not the most desirable, with big waves making it difficult for the radar system,” said the veteran, who considers this operation to be the “biggest challenge” his foundation has ever had to face.
“She is not a simple spokesperson who no longer wants to be in Venezuela. It was like transferring a rock star. She is the first Nobel Peace Prize laureate to be rescued, the first whose face appears on banners and posters. We have never rescued anyone with her status,” he added.
RETURN TO VENEZUELA
Regarding the possibility of Machado returning to Venezuela, as raised by the opponent herself, Stern advised her not to do so. “I think she’s crazy for thinking that, but she’s very strong, they don’t call her the Iron Lady for nothing,” she noted.
“I told you: don’t come back,” he declared, while warning that his team “never tried to introduce anyone to a country.” “We’ve only done extractions, never the other way around. She’s the one who has to decide if she should come back, but I think she shouldn’t. But she wants to and she’s a real inspiration,” he concluded.
Machado assured Thursday that she intends to return to Venezuela after being rewarded in Oslo, the city where she arrived after almost a year in an unknown location following the presidential elections held in 2024 in Venezuela, in which her candidacy was rejected in favor of that of opponent Edmundo González.
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