The US offers a $ 50 million award for Venezuela Nicholas Maduro arrest

The US has doubled a reward for information leading to the arrest of Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro to $ 50 million ($ 37.2 million, accusing him of being “one of the largest drug trafficking in the world.”

US President Donald Trump is a longtime critic of Maduro, who returned to office in January after an election marked by allegations of voting. The results were widely rejected by the international community.

Prosecutor Pam Bondi said the United States would double their announced prize for $ 25 million (£ 18.6m)And he said that Maduro was directly linked to drug smuggling operations.

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Ivan Gill said the new award was “pathetic” and marks it “political propaganda”.

“We are not surprised by who comes from,” Gill said, accusing Bondi of attempting to ‘desperate distraction’ of titles related to A feedback on the handling of the case to the sexual criminal Jeffrey Epstein.

During Trump’s first term, the US government accused Maduro and other high-ranking Venezuelan officials with a number of crimes, including Narco terrorism, corruption and drug trafficking.

At that time, the US Department of Justice claimed that Maduro worked with the Colombian rebel group FARC to “use cocaine as a weapon of” flooding “the United States.

In a video published on Thursday, Bondi accused Maduro of coordinating groups such as Tren de Aragua, a Venezuela gang that the Trump administration has announced a terrorist organization – and Cartel Sinaloa, a powerful criminal network based in Mexico.

She claims that the US Drug Administration (DEA) has “seized 30 tonnes of cocaine associated with Maduro and his associates with nearly seven tonnes of Maduro himself.”

Previously, Maduro rejected US claims that he was directly involved in drug trafficking.

Bondi’s comments are a continuation of the long -standing tensions between the US and the Venezuelan government – but the Prosecutor General did not provide additional indications of how the government envisages the updated appeal and the monetary incentive will lead to results.

Maduro – who is the leader of the United Socialist Party and inherited Hugo Chavez in 2013 – has been repeatedly charged with suppressing opposition groups and jamming disagreement in Venezuela, including the use of violence.

He kept protests after the challenged election last year and kept his grip on power.

But in June Hugo Carvajal – a former head of Venezuela’s military intelligence – it was Convicted of several drugs of drug trafficking after being arrested in Madrid and in court.

Carvajal was a fearsome named El Polo, or Chicken, but escaped from Venezuela after urging the army to support a candidate for opposition and to overthrow Maduro.

Initially, he denied drug allegations, but later changed his request to guilty, nourishing speculation that he had concluded a deal with US authorities for a smaller sentence in exchange for incriminating information about Maduro.

The United Kingdom and the EU have announced sanctions against the Maduro government after returning to office earlier this year.