A citizen of Colombia, Venezuela's neighbor, said that the recent U.S. military action against Venezuela sets a dangerous and "chilling" precedent, warning it could embolden the United States to pursue further interventions in Latin America.
The United States launched a large-scale strike on Venezuela on Jan 3, during which Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife were 'captured and flown out of Venezuela' according to a social media post by U.S. President Donald Trump.
"For the longest time that I can possibly remember in my lifetime, we've never had America bombing a Latin American country. So this is historic and chilling," said Fernando Munoz Bernal in an interview with China Media Group (CMG) on Sunday. He described the ease with which the U.S. appeared to act as deeply troubling.
"This sets a very important precedent, because it's so easy for America to violate international law, to violate the United Nations Charter, and nobody is going to stop him," he said.
"When it's so easy, it emboldens the United States to just go ahead and do more, go ahead and keep on taking resources. I wonder if we should be surprised if tomorrow they decide to take the Panama Canal, if tomorrow they decide to just take Greenland as they say they would. Because there's no guardrails, there's nobody to stop this immoral, criminal, terrorist regime that is America," said Munoz Bernal.
The Colombian national linked his personal anxiety to a perceived pattern of behavior.
"So I'm extremely worried, little sleep, and I'm Colombian, I'm not Venezuelan. But I see these steps of a big animal coming down the path. I think that we're next and I worried about that quite a lot. But then again, this is just my feeling. This is not based on anything that I know or that I've heard. But you can see the pattern. You can see the way the river flows," he said.
Colombian citizen says US Venezuela action sets 'chilling' precedent
