US Strike On Venezuela Sets 'Troubling Precedent', Say UAE Experts

(MENAFN- Khaleej Times)

The United States is setting a“troubling precedent” in international law by capturing Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, according to political analysts. On Saturday, US President Donald Trump confirmed on Truth Social that the Venezuelan leader was captured along with his wife after a series of“large-scale strikes” on the South American country.

This follows a months-long strife between the US and Venezuela, wherein Trump has repeatedly stated that Venezuela needed a regime change. In November, he gave the South American leader an ultimatum: to either give up power or be forcefully removed.

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According to political analysts, these strikes and the capture of a sitting president sets a new precedent, that, although the US has carried out unilateral military strikes in other nations, this is first of which a sitting leader was the target.

'Mafia-style politics'

Jesse Marks, CEO and executive director at Rihla Research & Advisory LLC, called the move a“new era of Godfather-style foreign policy". He said that the US president is willing to use military force to compel sovereign leader to bend to his will, saying“it is mafia style politics".

“Labeling a foreign leader a "narcoterrorist" and using that designation to authorise regime change sets a troubling precedent,” Marks noted. He called it a“persistent degradation of international law", adding that the US strikes on Venezuela were conducted without congressional approval, without a UN Security Council mandate, and without any recognised legal framework for extracting a sitting head of state.

Although Trump wrote on social media that the attack was done“in conjunction with US Law Enforcement”, it has not done so with the approval of congress.

Marks added that this will sharpen the partisan divide between Democrats and Republicans.“Democrats will likely argue that the operation constitutes war requiring congressional approval and Republicans will likely insist it was a law enforcement action that doesn't meet the legal threshold for 'war,'” he said.

'Strategic language to justify force'

Trump's cabinet has been touting this as a national security operation for months. Emirati columnist and analyst, Eisa Eisa Abdalla AlZarooni, noted that this operation was not presented as an“intervention” per se; rather, it was“wrapped in a security and judicial narrative by linking the Venezuelan leadership to organised crime and drug trafficking,” he said.

AlZarooni added that the language used is a strategic tool, in which it becomes easier to justify the use of military force.“The use of force outside a UN mandate or a clearly defined framework of legitimate self-defense effectively redefines sovereignty as a state's ability to protect itself, rather than a guaranteed right. This is a dangerous shift in the logic of the international system,” the analyst said.

What's next?

Dr Paulo Botta, the head of TRENDS Research & Advisory Latin America Virtual Office, said that at this early stage, the situation in Venezuela is similar to that involving the de facto leader of Panama, Manuel Antonion Noriega, after he was captured and tried in a US court in 1990. On Saturday night, Maduro and his wife arrived in a New York detention facility, reportedly to be tried for drugs and weapons charges, according to the BBC.

The action of abducting a sitting president of a sovereign country will have a big impact on the rules of the international system itself, rather than on relations between the US and other Latin American countries, Botta said.“In this system, pure realism reigns supreme, leaving little room for international organisations or negotiated solutions,” he explained.

Inside the country itself, Venezuela will now have to face a key question of who will take control of the armed forces, intelligence services, and the police, and who will control the money flows, said Kristian Alexander, lead researcher and assistant professor at Rabdan Academy.

Additionally, if chaos ensues, bad actors, like drug traffickers and criminals, may take advantage of a lack of governance and expand their influence along border corridors and maritime routes, she said.

“If a foreign power captures the sitting leader by force and announces that it will oversee governance“until transition", that is regime change in practice, regardless of whether it is branded as counter-narcotics, counterterrorism, or law enforcement,” Alexander added.

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