US Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe has traveled to Venezuela and met interim president Delcy Rodriguez, a US administration official said on Friday, marking the highest-level American visit since the fall of former president Nicolas Maduro.
President Donald Trump dispatched the CIA chief to Caracas on Thursday for talks that lasted approximately two hours, US sources said. The visit came less than two weeks after Maduro and his wife were seized in a US military operation.
“At President Trump’s direction, Director Ratcliffe traveled to Venezuela to meet with interim president Delcy Rodriguez to deliver the message that the United States looks forward to an improved working relationship,” the Trump administration official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
According to the official, Ratcliffe and Rodriguez “discussed potential opportunities for economic collaboration and that Venezuela can no longer be a safe haven for America’s adversaries, especially narcotraffickers.”
CIA Visit Marks Strategic Shift in U.S.–Venezuela Relations
The visit took place a day after Trump spoke with Rodriguez for the first time. It also coincided with a White House meeting in which Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado presented Trump with her Nobel Peace prize.
Trump has so far backed Rodriguez—Maduro’s former vice president and a once-vocal ally of the ousted leader—to remain in charge, provided Venezuelan oil continues to flow.
Ratcliffe, who sits at Trump’s cabinet meetings, is the most senior US official to visit Venezuela since the United States toppled the leftist Maduro government.
US sources described the CIA chief’s trip as a “trust-building measure” intended to pave the way for continued communication between Washington and Caracas.
They added that the visit was coordinated among the White House, the US State Department and the Pentagon.
AFP
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