(Reuters) -Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said early on Thursday his country would deploy military, police and civilian defenses at 284 “battlefront” locations across the country, his latest show of military capacity amid heightened tensions with the U.S.
The Trump administration has ratcheted up the U.S. military presence in the southern Caribbean, as part of what it says is a crackdown on drug smugglers, and ordered the deployment of 10 F-35 fighter jets to a Puerto Rico airfield.
Last week a U.S. military strike in the Caribbean killed 11 people and sank a boat from Venezuela that Trump said was transporting illegal narcotics, though his administration has provided scant information about the incident, even amid demands from members of the U.S. Congress.
Maduro, who has alleged the U.S. military is hoping to drive him from power and whose government has said a Trump video of the strike is artificial intelligence, did not say how many military, police or civilian militias would participate in the new deployment.
His government has already announced an increase of 25,000 troops for states along Venezuela’s border with Colombia that are a drug trafficking hub.
“We’re ready for an armed fight, if it’s necessary,” Maduro said from Ciudad Caribia, on the country’s central coast, in an early morning broadcast on state television where he was flanked by his defense minister.
“Along all the Venezuelan coasts, from the border with Colombia to the east of the country, from north to south and east to west, we have a full preparation of official troops,” he said.
The U.S. last month doubled its reward for information leading to the arrest of Maduro to $50 million over allegations of drug trafficking and links to criminal groups.
Maduro has always denied the accusations and his government says Venezuela is not a drug producer.
(Reporting by Reuters, Editing by William Maclean)
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