The deposed Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro pleaded not guilty to drugs, weapons and narco-terrorism charges on Monday, two days after his capture by US special forces in an operation ordered by Donald Trump that sent shockwaves around the world.
As Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, addressed the court in lower Manhattan, the UN security council held an emergency meeting where a dozen countries condemned the US 'crime of aggression' and the secretary general, António Guterres, suggested the operation constituted a breach of international law.
Maduro, 63, insisted to federal judge Alvin Hellerstein that he was 'still president of my country', had been illegally 'captured' at his Caracas home and was 'a prisoner of war'. The criminal indictment unveiled on Saturday by the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, echoed Trump's claims that his unilateral military intervention in Venezuela was necessary to stem a flow of drugs into the US.
But Trump has also justified Maduro's abduction as a way for the US to seize 'stolen' oil from Venezuela, and promised that the US would 'run' Venezuela for the foreseeable future while US energy companies take control of the country's rich oil reserves.
