Below is the text of the statement by the Communist Party of Venezuela.
The Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV) ─ elected by the XVI National Congress, Nov. 2022 ─ reiterates its strongest and most categorical condemnation of the criminal bombings carried out by United States military forces on the city of Caracas and other locations in the country during the early morning hours of January 3, an action that constitutes a serious aggression against national sovereignty and a flagrant violation of international law.
The PCV rejects the violent and illegal detention of citizens Nicolás Maduro Moros and Cilia Flores, carried out in the context of this foreign military intervention. The United States is once again acting as the world’s policeman, applying its laws extraterritorially and openly disregarding the principles of sovereignty, self-determination of peoples, and non-interference. US laws have no jurisdiction in Venezuela, and no foreign power is entitled to impose its will by force of arms.
This position does not imply, under any circumstances, any political defense of the authoritarian, anti-democratic, anti-worker, and anti-popular administration of Nicolás Maduro, who exercised de facto power as President of the Republic. Maduro and the leadership of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) have been responsible for serious violations of the Constitution, the laws, and the political, labor, and social rights of working people, creating favorable conditions for imperialist plans of siege and aggression against the country.
Three days have passed since the military aggression by Donald Trump’s government, and so far the Venezuelan authorities have not presented an official report on civilian and military casualties, the material damage caused by the bombings, much less an explanation for the security forces’ inability to detect and respond to a foreign military aggression. This silence is not only unacceptable, but suspicious. The country has a right to know the truth about the consequences of this act of war.
Donald Trump has openly confirmed that the supposed “fight against drug trafficking” was nothing more than a vulgar excuse to cover up his true objectives: control of Venezuela’s oil and strategic resources. His statements, in which he affirms that he will govern Venezuela and take charge of administering its oil resources, confirm the openly neocolonial and predator nature of this intervention.
The fact that the Trump administration has made public its demands on the new Venezuelan authorities—including privileged access for US companies to the country’s oil resources, as well as a ban on the sale of crude oil and the severing of relations with nations that the administration considers enemies of US interests— confirms that the conflict currently afflicting Venezuelans is part of the fierce dispute between imperialist powers and rising capitalist nations for control of markets, raw materials, trade routes, and areas of influence, in the context of a worsening structural crisis of capitalism on a global scale.
The facts also confirm what the PCV has repeatedly denounced: the PSUV leadership was negotiating behind the country’s back with Washington, while the Venezuelan people were plunged into an acute political, economic, and social crisis. Proof of this are the calls for “cooperation” and “shared development” made by Delcy Rodríguez in the face of threats and impositions by the imperialist power.
It should also be noted that this military operation was irresponsibly promoted by the most reactionary sector of the opposition, led by María Corina Machado, who has now been displaced by her own allies, who have made it clear that neither democracy nor human rights guide their actions, but rather that their true ambitions are focused on controlling and appropriating Venezuela’s energy industry, even if that means maintaining the current regime as their enforcement arm.
U.S. military interference, although encouraged by internal sectors, does not contribute to overcoming the national crisis; on the contrary, it aggravates it. The living conditions of the Venezuelan people continue to deteriorate, while the ruling elite takes no measures to restore the rights and dignity of the working class.
We also warn of the dangerous implications of the recent decree of exception, which could become an instrument of repression in the hands of actors who have maintained their hegemony through terror after losing popular support.
The PCV insists on the urgent need to build a popular, constitutional, democratic, and sovereign political solution to the crisis. Neither occupation nor imperialist tutelage, nor the continuation of the authoritarian regime, constitute favorable solutions for the working people.
That all persons arbitrarily detained following Nicolás Maduro’s invalid proclamation as president be released immediately, including Enrique Márquez, who was kidnapped a year ago for demanding the publication of the presidential election results, as well as all activists imprisoned for fighting for and defending the constitutional rights of the Venezuelan people.
Wages and pensions must be rescued from the abyss into which the PSUV’s neoliberal program has plunged them. The dignity of Venezuelan working families depends on it.
The way out of the current dangerous crisis and the real threat of an imperialist military escalation is to put an end to the authoritarian regime and restore constitutional order by reestablishing democratic freedoms and immediately calling presidential elections, with full guarantees for citizens and political organizations. To this end, the current CNE authorities must resign and political parties—including the PCV—must regain their legal status.
The struggle for the restoration of the Constitution and the rule of law calls on all revolutionary, popular, and genuinely democratic forces in the country.
Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Venezuela
Caracas, January 6, 2026
