Bolton Obstructed US-Venezuela Relations: President Maduro

On Wednesday, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro revealed that former Secretary of State John Bolton blocked a meeting with then-President Donald Trump at the United Nations General Assembly in 2018.

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"Trump and I almost met. Both of us wanted to see each other, and I was ready to go meet with Trump. However, we received a call announcing that the meeting was postponed, even though the coordination of the encounter was already in place," the Bolivarian leader said during the airing of a new episode of the Maduro Podcast.

The Venezuelan president said that Bolton did everything possible to avoid a meeting with Trump, which allowed the U.S. aggression against Venezuela to continue.

"We would have avoided many things because they trapped Trump. They told him that Juan Guaido was a great leader and that he would overthrow Maduro," the Bolivarian leader said, adding that a meeting with Trump would have allowed them to reach mutual understandings.

Maduro regretted that Trump subsequently supported the right-wing opposition politician Juan Guaido in his pretense to usurp the Venezuelan presidency.

The Bolivarian leader explained that the U.S. recognition of the supposed "interim president" allowed opposition politicians such as Leopoldo Lopez, Antonio Ledezma, and Julio Borges to steal billions of dollars belonging to the Venezuelan state.

During his podcast transmission, Maduro also revealed that Bolton tried to strip Venezuela of its membership in the United Nations in 2019.

In response to this political maneuver, he sent Vice President Delcy Rodriguez and diplomat Samuel Moncada, who successfully thwarted the threat.