Browne warns U.S. action in Venezuela already affecting flights to Antigua
Prime Minister Gaston Browne says recent U.S. military action in Venezuela has already begun to affect air travel in the region, warning that even brief disruptions can have serious consequences for tourism-dependent countries like Antigua and Barbuda.
Speaking on Pointe FM’s Browne and Browne Show on Saturday, Browne said flight cancellations followed shortly after the operation, underscoring the Caribbean’s vulnerability to external shocks.
“Half an hour of military action in Venezuela has resulted now in a number of cancellation of flights,” Browne said.
He said Antigua and Barbuda had so far seen about six flight cancellations, but stressed that the impact should not be underestimated.
“Luckily for us, we don’t have that many. I think we have probably about six flights that have been canceled,” he said. “But six flights in a small island state with a few hundred thousand tourists is significant.”
Browne warned that a prolonged conflict could have far more damaging effects, not only on tourism but on basic economic stability.
“If it’s protracted, and the boats stop coming to this country, the planes stop coming to this country, what do you think will happen to us?” he said. “We can’t even feed ourselves.”
He contrasted Antigua and Barbuda’s exposure with larger economies in the region that have greater financial buffers.
“Unlike Trinidad and Tobago, which has probably about six billion U.S. dollars in reserves, we don’t have any reserves,” Browne said.
The prime minister said these risks explain why he has consistently called for de-escalation and diplomacy, arguing that military conflict in the region disproportionately affects small island states.
He added that the early flight disruptions highlight the need for greater resilience, including strengthened food security and economic diversification, to reduce Antigua and Barbuda’s dependence on external supply chains and tourism flows.
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But Prime Minister Gaston ‘Reactive’ Browne, weren’t you warned of the over reliance and the volatility of the tourism sector (and especially after virtual shutdown of the country during the Covid-19 pandemic).
You and your apathetic cabinet members buried your heads in the sand (probably on Half Moon Bay) when you all had ample opportunities to develop other sectors in manufacturing, the green economy and other potential markets.
ABLP are well known for their REACTIVE measures rather than PROACTIVE ones. A simple deduction from the growing band of critical thinkers in Antigua & Barbuda 🇦🇬
How did we end up with such a laissez-faire government? 🤔
Caribbean ‘politicians’ implicated in Maduro’s criminal charges…
In an unprecedented international operation, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were arrested early yesterday during a United States military strike in Caracas, and taken to New York to face criminal charges.
The arrest comes amid a sweeping indictment that alleges Maduro, his family, and top government officials orchestrated decades of cocaine trafficking and state-sponsored narco-terrorism.
In announcing the arrest, Secretary of Sate Marco Rubio said the US had saved US$50 million—the reward that was offered for Maduro’s capture.
The 700-page superseding indictment, filed earlier this month, alleges Maduro, along with Vice-President Diosdado Cabello Rondon, former interior minister Ramon Rodriguez Chacin, Flores, and Maduro’s son, National Assembly member Nicolas Ernesto Maduro Guerra, conspired to import “thousands of tonnes of cocaine” into the United States.
The indictment also names Hector Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, leader of the Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua (TdA), as a co-conspirator.
According to the Department of Justice, Maduro and his associates abused their positions to turn Venezuela into a haven for drug traffickers and violent criminal organisations, enriching themselves while undermining public institutions.
The indictment details a network of clandestine shipments, military escorts for drug-laden planes, and coordination with international criminal groups, including Colombian guerrillas and Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel.
“The defendants allegedly used the state apparatus to facilitate massive drug trafficking and terrorism,” the indictment states. “Their actions inflicted harm on both the Venezuelan people and international law enforcement.”
The indictment specifies that while serving as Venezuela’s Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2006 to 2008, Maduro provided diplomatic passports to traffickers, allowing cocaine shipments to move undetected.
Officials allegedly oversaw large drug shipments, sometimes personally supervising planes at state airports. Family members were also implicated: Flores is accused of accepting bribes to facilitate meetings with traffickers, while Maduro Guerra reportedly coordinated shipments on PDVSA-owned planes guarded by armed personnel.
The indictment makes a stunning claim that allegedly implicates unnamed Caribbean politicians.
Through this drug trafficking, NICOLAS MADURO MOROS, the defendant, and corrupt members of his regime enabled corruption fueled by drug trafficking throughout the region. The transshipment points in Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico similarly relied on a culture of corruption, in which cocaine traffickers operating in those countries paid a portion of their own profits to politicians who protected and aided them.
In turn, these politicians used the cocaine fueled payments to maintain and augment their political power. So, too, were politicians along the “Caribbean route” corrupted by cocaine traffickers, who would pay them for protection from arrest and to allow favored traffickers to operate with impunity as they trafficked cocaine from Venezuela north towards the United States.
Thus, at every step–relying on the producers in Colombia, transporters and distributors in Venezuela, and recipients and re-distributors on transshipment points north-the traffickers enriched themselves and their corrupt benefactors who protected and aided them.
It also accuses Maduro’s wife, Flores, of allegedly working together with her husband to traffic cocaine, maintain groups of state-sponsored gangs, and order kidnappings, beatings, and murders against those who owed them drug money
Early yesterday, US forces executed a precise operation in Caracas, resulting in the capture of Maduro and Flores. According to US officials, the operation was conducted with minimal force and without civilian casualties.
Following the arrests, both were flown by helicopter to the Iwo Jima in the Caribbean Sea, before being taken to the US to face charges of narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, and possession of machine guns and destructive devices.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi praised the operation in a statement on social media: “Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been indicted in the Southern District of New York. Nicolas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States.
“They will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts. On behalf of the entire US DOJ, I would like to thank President Trump for having the courage to demand accountability on behalf of the American People, and a huge thank you to our brave military who conducted the incredible and highly successful mission to capture these two alleged international narco traffickers.”
However, Venezuela’s government condemned the US action.
Foreign Minister Yvan Gil dismissed the increase in bounty as “pathetic”, and accused Bondi of orchestrating a “crude political propaganda operation”. Gil said the announcement was “the most ridiculous smokescreen ever seen”, calling the US action a politically motivated manoeuvre rather than a law enforcement operation.
The indictment links the Maduro regime to a host of international criminal organisations, including the Colombian FARC and ELN guerrillas, Mexico’s Zetas (Cartel del Noreste), and Venezuela’s TdA gang. These groups allegedly provided logistical support, protection, and weapons for the transport of cocaine, generating vast profits for the Venezuelan regime and reinforcing its control.