‘Law of the Jungle prevails’: Shashi Tharoor reacts to US striking Venezuela and capturing Maduro

Shashi Tharoor described the US action of striking Venezuela and capturing President Nicolas Maduro as a “law of the jungle”, saying that “international law and the UN Charter have for some years now been honoured in the breach”.

“International law and the UN Charter have for some years now been honoured in the breach, @kapskom . The Law of the Jungle prevails today. “Might is Right” is the new creed,” said Tharoor in a post on X.

US ‍President Donald Trump said on Saturday he was putting Venezuela under temporary American control after the United States captured President Nicolas Maduro in an audacious raid and whisked him to New York to face drug-trafficking charges.
“We will run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition,” Trump said during ⁠a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida. “We can’t take a chance that someone else takes over Venezuela who doesn’t have the interests of Venezuelans in mind.” Trump said as part of the takeover, major U.S. oil companies would move into Venezuela, which has the world’s largest oil reserves, and refurbish badly degraded oil infrastructure, a process experts said could take years.

Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were transported to a U.S. Navy ship offshore before being flown to the U.S. on Saturday evening. Video showed a plane arriving at Stewart International Airport about 60 miles (97 km) northwest of New York City, with several U.S. personnel boarding the aircraft after it landed. A Justice Department official confirmed Maduro had landed in ‌New York, and video later showed a large convoy arriving at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn under a heavy police presence.

Maduro, who was indicted on various U.S. charges, including narco-terrorism conspiracy, is expected to make an initial appearance in Manhattan federal court on Monday, according to a Justice Department official. His wife also faces charges, including cocaine importation conspiracy.
A Venezuelan court later ordered Rodriguez to assume the position of interim president. In the U.S. some legal experts questioned the legality of an operation to seize the head of state of a foreign power, and Democrats who said they were misled during recent briefings demanded a plan on what would now follow.