US claims ‘secret talks’ to topple Maduro regime in Venezuela

A SENIOR Trump administration official has claimed that Washington has been in secret talks with Diosdado Cabello, the second-in-command in the Venezuelan regime and the man regarded by many as the true power behind Nicolás Maduro, the president.

A second meeting is planned after a US intermediary in Caracas met Mr Cabello in July, the official told the Associated Press, as an attempt to penetrate Mr Maduro’s inner circle and foment the collapse of his government from within.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the US would not facilitate Mr Cabello remaining in power or replacing Mr Maduro but hoped that those close to Hugo Chávez’s appointed successor might be persuaded to betray him if they were guaranteed immunity from prosecution for alleged abuses and crimes.

That goal had appeared close to being achieved in April, when Juan Guaidó – the opposition leader recognised by the US and dozens of other countries as Venezuela’s rightful president – launched an uprising supported by military defectors.

In the ensuing chaos, John Bolton, the US national security adviser, publicly identified three key Maduro allies – General Vladimir Padrino López, the defence minister, and the heads of the supreme court and presidential guard – as having conspired with the opposition against the far-left leader.

He urged them to act quickly, saying it was their “last chance” to have sanctions against them removed by bringing the rest of the military behind Mr Guaidó. But Mr Bolton spoke too soon, and Mr Maduro’s generals rallied around him, crushing the rebellion in a bloody crackdown. Gen Padrino said the attempt to “buy” him was a “deceitful, stupid offer”.

Manuel Cristopher Figuera, chief of the intelligence agency SEBIN, fled the country, later surfacing in the US with an account of how Gen Padrino and coconspirators had lost their nerve. He was replaced with a former intelligence chief close to Mr Cabello – an appointment widely interpreted as a sign that the latter’s influence was expanding as Mr Maduro’s waned.

The support of Mr Cabello, the 56-year-old power broker alleged to have controlling fingers in rackets from drug-trafficking to illegal mining and to direct pro-government paramilitary groups, is now regarded by many as key to Mr Maduro’s survival as president.

Mr Cabello, vice-president of the ruling PSUV and head of the constituent assembly installed to bypass the opposition-controlled parliament, is considered more radical, ruthless and calculating than Mr Maduro himself.

US officials have accused him of discussing an assassination plot against Marco Rubio, the Florida senator who described Mr Cabello as the “Pablo Escobar” of Venezuela.

Last week, Mr Rubio said he had “no doubt” Mr Cabello had always wanted to be president and would oust Mr Maduro if he gained control of the regime’s apparatus.

Mr Cabello has not commented on the reported talks but did retweet a post mocking the idea that the US would expose its own “secret plan”.