The Government of Venezuela announced this Thursday that the United States was “unilaterally” suspending the deportation flight of Venezuelan citizens that was scheduled for Friday.
Although US authorities have warned of an alleged risk of flying over Venezuela amid Washington’s military deployment near its coasts, which has caused the massive cancellation of international connections to and from Caracas, deportation flights from the United States to Venezuelan territory had continued regularly until now.
This Thursday, however, “the decision of the United States government to unilaterally suspend the return of Venezuelan citizens who had planned to return on December 12 has been received,” announced the Ministry of the Interior, cited by EFE.
The message adds that “the suspension interrupts a process that had been carried out in a coordinated manner and that represented a way to alleviate the situation of fellow citizens detained and persecuted on US soil.”
On November 29, US President Donald Trump declared that Venezuelan airspace would remain “completely closed” and the Venezuelan Government canceled deportation flights.
Chavista Foreign Minister Yván Gil explained on November 3 that Washington “had verbally suspended the execution of these flights” but then had requested them again, which led to them being resumed.
The latest message this Thursday about the flight scheduled for December 12 increases doubts about the tension between the United States and Venezuela, two countries without relations since 2019 that, however, have maintained two weekly deportation flights – on Wednesdays and Fridays – since January.
According to official information, Venezuela has received 98 flights of this type since the agreement was signed at the beginning of this year, the majority coming from the United States although some have arrived from Mexico. Since November 21, when US authorities warned of the risk of flying over Venezuela and the southern Caribbean, at least three flights have arrived from the United States and two from Mexico.
Recently, Trump has declared that Maduro’s “days are numbered” and that he will soon begin ground operations in Venezuela, in a military pressure campaign that he justifies as a way to combat drug trafficking and that has already left more than 80 people dead as a result of attacks by the US Army in the Caribbean and the Pacific against boats that were supposedly transporting drugs.
The Venezuelan Ministry of the Interior assured in its message that the suspension of the December 12 flight “contradicts the official discourse” of the United States “regarding the situation of migrants in its territory and generates uncertainty among Venezuelan families who were waiting for their reunion.”
Despite the communication and according to cnn“deportation flights to Venezuela will continue,” a US administration official said this Friday.
