{"id":56756,"date":"2026-01-06T09:16:02","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T09:16:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/maduro-tells-us-court-i-am-still-president-as-he-pleads-not-guilty-to-drug\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T11:11:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T11:11:15","slug":"maduro-tells-us-court-i-am-still-president-as-he-pleads-not-guilty-to-drug","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/maduro-tells-us-court-i-am-still-president-as-he-pleads-not-guilty-to-drug\/","title":{"rendered":"Maduro tells US court \u2018I am still president\u2019 as he pleads not guilty to drug charges"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cI am innocent. I am not guilty,\u201d Maduro told the court, according to journalists present at the hearing. He told the court he had been \u201ckidnapped\u201d from his residence in Caracas and insisted that, despite being in US custody, he was still the president of Venezuela.<\/p>\n<p>Maduro appeared alongside his wife, Cilia Flores, who also rejected all charges levelled against her by US prosecutors, saying she was completely innocent. <\/p>\n<p>The court set March 17 as the date for the next hearing in the case.<\/p>\n<p>The courtroom proceedings were tense and closely watched, coming just days after Maduro and Flores were seized in a dramatic US military operation. According to US officials, special forces extracted the pair from their residence within the heavily guarded Fort Tiuna military complex in the Venezuelan capital early on Saturday before flying them to New York.<\/p>\n<p>During Monday\u2019s hearing, a brief but heated exchange broke out between Maduro and a member of the public in the courtroom. At one point, Maduro described himself as a \u201cprisoner of war&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier in the day, images circulated showing Maduro and Flores being transferred to the courthouse in handcuffs, surrounded by heavily armed officers. The scenes fuelled strong reactions both inside Venezuela and internationally.<\/p>\n<p>In Caracas, Vice President Delcy Rodr\u00edguez was sworn in as interim president, a move that Venezuelan authorities said was aimed at ensuring continuity of government. During the ceremony, Rodr\u00edguez praised Maduro and Flores as \u201cheroes,\u201d accusing the United States of carrying out an illegal act against a sovereign nation.<\/p>\n<p>Outside the New York courthouse, protesters gathered to denounce the US action. Demonstrators waved banners reading \u201cFree Maduro,\u201d \u201cNo War on Venezuela,\u201d and \u201cUSA hands off Venezuela,\u201d while chanting slogans against what they described as foreign intervention.<\/p>\n<p>The US operation has triggered widespread condemnation and raised serious concerns across the international community, with critics warning that it represents a dangerous escalation in Washington\u2019s long-running campaign against Maduro.<\/p>\n<p>US officials have said the operation was planned for months and carried out without prior congressional authorisation. The Trump administration has defended the move as part of broader efforts to combat alleged drug trafficking networks linked to the Venezuelan leadership.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"spip-document spip-document-100277 aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/jpg\/download_1_-8.jpg\" alt=\"Nicol\u00e1s Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were escorted by armed guards in tactical gear from a Brooklyn detention centre to a helicopter bound for a federal court in Manhattan, where the couple pleaded not guilty to a raft of drug trafficking and related charges.\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Captured Venezuelan President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro on Monday pleaded not guilty to a raft of drug trafficking and related charges during his first appearance before a federal court in New York, defiantly telling the judge that he remains the country\u2019s legitimate head of state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":2000100278,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[75],"byline":[192],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-56756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-homenews","byline-wycliffe-nyamasege"],"bylines":[{"id":192,"name":"Wycliffe Nyamasege","slug":"wycliffe-nyamasege","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":131}],"contributors":[{"id":192,"name":"Wycliffe Nyamasege","slug":"wycliffe-nyamasege","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":131}],"featured_image":{"id":2000100278,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/maduro_and_wife_arraigned.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000100278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56756"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=56756"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=56756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}