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.
The brevity and formality of the arraignment hearing in federal court in Manhattan – barely 30 minutes during which Maduro was asked to confirm his name and that he understood the four charges against him – belied the far-reaching consequences of the US action.
As Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores addressed the court in lower Manhattan, the UN security council held an emergency meeting just a few miles to the north, where a dozen countries condemned the US “crime of aggression” and 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”.
“I am innocent. I am not guilty. I am a decent man,” Maduro said in Spanish during repeated attempts to speak over the judge.




The nonprofit charged by Congress with allocating funds to NPR, PBS and other US public radio and television stations announced is dissolving after massive federal funding cuts under Donald Trump.
The Trump administration sued two California cities on Monday, seeking to block local laws that restrict natural gas infrastructure and appliances in new construction.
Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth has backed down from previous threats to court-martial retired Navy captain Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Arizona, for his role in a video telling service members they "can refuse illegal orders."
Israeli occupation forces carried out a series of invasions, abductions, and movement restrictions across the occupied West Bank on Sunday, targeting communities in Salfit in the central West Bank, Qalqilia in the northwestern West Bank, Ramallah in the central West Bank, Nablus in the northern West Bank, and occupied Jerusalem.





























