7 d. ago World leaders in Davos must stand up to Trump. This is their chance | Robert Reich

The world needs global leaders to clearly and firmly denounce the havoc Trump is wreaking on the US and international orderHundreds of global CEOs, finance titans, and more than 60 prime ministers and presidents are in Davos, Switzerland, for the annual confab of the world’s powerful and wealthy: the World Economic Forum.This year’s Davos meeting occurs at a time when Donald Trump is not just unleashing his brownshirts on Minneapolis and other American cities, but also dismantling the international order that’s largely been in place since the end of the second world war – threatening Nato, withdrawing from international organizations including the UN climate treaty, violating the UN charter by invading Venezuela and abducting Nicolás Maduro, upending established trade rules, and demanding that the US annex Greenland.Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his n...

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9 d. ago Mother reveals chilling last words from son who died in Venezuela during Maduro capture mission

Saul Pereira Martinez, 18, spoke to his family for final time before being killed in U.S. air strikes on Caracas as part of operation to abduct former president Nicolas Maduro on January 3

Events

1 week ago CIA chief visits Maduro successor as Machado vows to become Venezuela’s president

John Ratcliffe meets Delcy Rodríguez in Caracas less than two weeks after his agents helped to oust her precedessorThe CIA chief whose agents reputedly played a key role in abducting Nicolás Maduro has flown to Venezuela to meet his successor as the sidelined opposition leader, María Corina Machado, vowed she would become the country’s first elected female president.Machado’s comments were broadcast on Friday, a day after she handed her Nobel peace prize medal to Donald Trump in recognition of what she called a principled and decisive move against Maduro, whom US special forces snatched on 3 January. Continue reading...

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1 week ago María Corina Machado presents Trump with her Nobel peace prize medal

Trump heaped praise on the Venezuelan opposition leader for presenting him with ‘her Nobel peace prize for the work I have done’The Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has presented her gold Nobel peace prize medal to Donald Trump after meeting him in the White House, nearly a fortnight after he ordered the abduction of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro.Machado, who received the award last year for her struggle against Maduro’s “brutal, authoritarian state”, told reporters on Thursday she had done so “in recognition [of] his unique commitment [to] our freedom”. Continue reading...

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1 week ago María Corina Machado says she presented Trump with her Nobel peace prize medal

The Venezuelan opposition leader did not confirm whether the US president accepted the awardThe Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado has said she “presented” her gold Nobel peace prize medal to Donald Trump after meeting him in the White House, nearly a fortnight after he ordered the abduction of Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro.Machado, who received the award last year for her struggle against Maduro’s “brutal, authoritarian state”, told reporters she had done so “in recognition [of] his unique commitment [to] our freedom”. It was not immediately clear whether Trump had accepted the gift. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago 2026 is already pure chaos. Is that Trump’s electoral strategy? | Moustafa Bayoumi

Less than two weeks into the year, the US is stoking mayhem at home and abroad – with midterms coming in the autumnHave we ever seen a year in recent memory begin with as much deliberate turmoil as 2026 has? Less than two weeks into 2026, we have witnessed Donald Trump deploy US forces to depose and abduct the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, along with Cilia Flores, his wife and close political adviser. The US president then informed the world that the United States would “run” Venezuela for the time being, which he later explained could potentially last for several years.Trump has also threatened – and then seemingly made peace with – the president of Colombia; seized at least five oil tankers in the Caribbean (actions that UN experts label illegal armed aggression); promised US military strikes targeting cartels in Mexico against the wishes of Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum; and frightened the people of Cuba with the prospect that Marco Rubio could be their next presi...

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2 w. ago Revealed: FIFA have NO plans to axe controversial Peace Award given to President Donald Trump following abduction of Venezuelan dictator Maduro

MIKE KEEGAN: Some had wondered whether the Americans' subsequent abduction of Nicolas Maduro, which came weeks later, had triggered pause for thought at FIFA's headquarters.

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2 w. ago Trump’s territorial ambition: new imperialism or a case of the emperor’s new clothes?

Trump’s attack on Venezuela suggests expansionism is under way but some argue it is simply standard US foreign policy stripped of hypocrisyThe attack on Venezuela and the seizure of its president was a shocking enough start to 2026, but it was only the next day, when the smoke had dispersed and Donald Trump was flying from Florida to Washington DC in triumph, that it became clear the world had entered a new era.The US president was leaning on a bulkhead on Air Force One, in a charcoal suit and gold tie, regaling reporters with inside details of the abduction of Nicolás Maduro. He claimed his government was “in charge” of Venezuela and that US companies were poised to extract the country’s oil wealth. Continue reading...

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2 w. ago Militia men hunting traitors and families risking kidnap if they leave the house... if Trump thought abducting Maduro would make him a hero in oil

Citizens leave their homes only if they have no choice. Each time they do, they risk kidnap, torture and death in the regime's El Helicoide, the brutalist prison that looms menacingly over the city.

Events

2 w. ago With Venezuela, Trump has achieved his dream of making his own 80s action movie

Given his rise during the ego joyride of the 1980s, it’s no shock that Trump’s foreign policy is to emulate that decade’s belligerent cinemaThe box office barnstormer of 2026 arrived early this year. A sleazy banana-republic dictator flooding the American streets with blow. The over-the-border Delta Force extraction squad sent to pluck this schmo out of his impregnable fortress. The bronzed tough-talker who’s firing an RPG up the tailpipe of the international rules-based order – but who gets the job done. Call it: Caracas Thunder.Sounds like a bit of a throwback, you might be thinking. But, judging by his press conference after the US military’s abduction of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, Donald Trump seemed to have finally achieved his dream of directing his own 80s action movie. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Trump’s popularity with young men is collapsing due to ‘unnecessary wars,’ new poll shows

The poll found that voters wanted Trump to avoid ‘unnecessary wars’ weeks before he abducted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro

Politics

3 w. ago The Guardian view on Trump’s raid in Caracas: oil matters, but it’s not the whole story | Editorial

The seizure of Venezuelan leader was induced by the prize of petroleum, but driven by spectacle, geopolitics and domestic politicsIt’s all about oil. That was the reason Nicolás Maduro, the Venezuelan leader illegally abducted by US forces at the weekend, had given for Donald Trump’s fixation with his country. A better way to think about Venezuela is that oil was necessary but not sufficient. The presence of vast reserves made Mr Trump’s interest understandable – if Venezuela’s main export was bananas this would not have happened. But oil alone cannot explain the timing or scale of the move.Venezuelan crude is extra-heavy as well as expensive and slow to bring online; it will not immediately transform US energy systems, nor rescue refineries that have already adapted to years without it. Instead, oil is the “prize” around which other agendas cohere. These include future profits for US firms; modest downward pressure on oil prices; depriving China of a meaningful ally in Am...

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3 w. ago Venezuelan regime launches fierce crackdown on civil society in response to Trump's 'abduction' of Maduro

Interim leader Delcy Rodriguez has ordered her feared secret police to 'search and capture' any so-called collaborators following Saturday's special forces raid.

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3 w. ago Trump’s coup in Venezuela didn’t just break the rules – it showed there aren’t any. We’ll all regret that | Nesrine Malik

It’s not just the triumphalism in the White House. Leaders loth to oppose this gangsterism must think how that looks to Putin, Xi and in the UAEI never thought it possible that you could look back on the Iraq war, and the foreign invasions of the “war on terror” in general, and feel some measure of nostalgia. For a time when there were at least concerted attempts to justify unilateral interventions and illegal wars in the name of global security, and even a moral duty to liberate the women of Afghanistan or “free the Iraqi people”.Now, as the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, is in essence abducted and Venezuela taken over by the US, there is barely any effort to situate the coup in any reasoning other than the US’s interests. Nor are there any attempts to solicit consent from domestic or international law-making bodies and allies, let alone the public. The days of the US trying to convince the world that Saddam Hussein did in fact have weapons of mass destruction despite secret...

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3 w. ago 'At least we have hope now', says Venezuelan teacher who fled his homeland 10 years ago as question of 'What happens now?' lingers in wake of Trump's 'abduction' of dictator Nicolas Maduro

Donald Trump's extraordinary early hours special forces raid to capture Nicolas Maduro did not just catch the Venezuelan dictator unawares.

Politics

3 w. ago The ‘Putinization’ of US foreign policy has arrived in Venezuela

Trump is no longer bending the rules – he is demolishing them, with consequences far beyond CaracasUS strikes on Venezuela – live updatesHardly anyone expected 2026 to be a year of peace, and it was barely three days old when the worst fears were confirmed.The overnight strikes on Venezuela – and the abduction of its leader, Nicolás Maduro and his wife – have driven another truck through international law and global norms. But even that is not the most concerning thing about it. Continue reading...

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