Colombia has accepted more than 1.2 million Venezuelan refugees across their shared border.
By Kevin Sullivan Kevin Sullivan Senior correspondent covering national and international affairs Email Bio Follow March 3 at 6:11 PM BOGOTA, Colombia — Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s “days in power are about to end” because of growing international and domestic pressure on his “mafioso” government and increasing desertions by his military troops, Colombian President Iván Duque said Sunday.
Duque said he felt a moral urgency to help lead the opposition to Maduro. He likened the situation to that of people who can hear their next-door neighbor beating his wife and children every night. He said he was certain that Maduro would be forced to leave power soon as his public support dwindles to a small base of hardcore supporters, including armed groups known as colectivos.Duque’s optimism about Maduro’s ouster stands in contrast to analysts who fear that Maduro, who has been in power since 2013 and was reelected last year in balloting widely seen as tainted by fraud, has proven to be remarkably resilient in the face of an opposition that has long been disorganized and fractured.
He said he would not send Colombian troops into Venezuela, and he said he believed the United States would not, either. U.S. officials have downplayed the idea of any U.S. military involvement, but Trump and Vice President Pence have said “all options are on the table” as they have called for Maduro to go.
Maduro “does not want to accept any humanitarian aid for the people that are dying in Venezuela, and that is a crime against humanity,” Duque said. Duque said he believed Guaidó could pressure Maduro to leave peacefully because he had consolidated power enough among the Venezuelan opposition, military defectors and disillusioned former supporters of Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chávez.
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