NEW YORK / CARACAS: Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have formally petitioned a United States federal court to dismiss long-standing narcoterrorism and international drug trafficking charges brought against them by the US Department of Justice. The legal filing argues that as a sitting head of state of a sovereign nation, Maduro is entitled to full foreign sovereign immunity from criminal prosecution under established principles of international law and diplomatic conventions.
The federal indictment accuses Maduro and senior members of his administration of conspiring with illicit armed groups and international cartels to facilitate large-scale cocaine shipments into the United States. Defense attorneys challenged the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the US judiciary, contending that the prosecution is politically motivated and that domestic courts of a foreign nation lack legal standing to prosecute a foreign leader.
The motion asserts that the ongoing prosecution violates international sovereignty principles and United Nations charters. In contrast, US prosecutors maintain that because the United States government does not recognize the legitimacy of Maduro’s presidency, sovereign immunity protections do not apply to him. The legal dispute marks a new escalation in diplomatic friction between Washington and Caracas.
