Venezuela’s armed forces have added 5,600 new troops as Washington intensifies its military pressure on the Latin American country, Press TV reports.
Saturday’s swearing-in ceremony at Fuerte Tiuna, the capital’s largest military base, came after President Nicolas Maduro urged heightened enlistment.
Washington has alleged, without offering evidence, that Maduro heads the drug Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Sun), which it labeled a terrorist organization last month.
Maduro says the US administration of President Donald Trump seeks to depose him and seize the nation’s oil resources.
Addressing the event, Colonel Gabriel Alejandro Rendon Vilchez, one of the officials who conducted the ceremony, declared, “Under no circumstances will we allow an invasion by an imperialist force.”
Official data indicate that Venezuela’s armed forces comprise 200,000 troops and another 200,000 police personnel.
bd-pratidin/GR
