President Donald Trump announced Saturday that the airspace above and surrounding Venezuela should be considered “closed in its entirety.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“To all Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers, please consider THE AIRSPACE ABOVE AND SURROUNDING VENEZUELA TO BE CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY,” Trump posted, giving no further details about potential action from the U.S. against Venezuela as the Trump administration ramps up the pressure against alleged drug cartels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
ABC News has reached out to the White House for more information.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Last week, the Federal Aviation Administration warned major airlines about a “potentially hazardous” situation in the skies over Venezuela, citing “worsening security” and “heightened military activity” that could threaten aircraft at all altitudes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Following that announcement, six international carriers suspended flights to Venezuela’s capital Caracas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In response to Trump’s post, the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry released a statement, calling it “a hostile, unilateral, and arbitrary act, incompatible with the most basic principles of International Law.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The statement called on the UN and international community to “firmly reject this immoral act of aggression,” which it said “amounts to a threat against the sovereignty and security of our Homeland, the Caribbean, and northern South America.”<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Venezuelan officials said the announcement will halt deportation flights carrying Venezuelans from the U.S. back to Venezuela, saying Trump’s announcement “unilaterally suspended the Venezuelan migrant flights that were regularly and weekly being carried out.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump’s announcement came two days after a call with service members on Thanksgiving, during which he said land action against alleged drug traffickers in Venezuela would be starting “very soon.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n “You probably noticed that people aren’t wanting to be delivering by sea, and we’ll be starting to stop them by land. Also the land is easier, but that’s going to start very soon,” Trump said, adding “We warned them: stop sending poison to our country.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump has been ramping up military pressure on Venezuela with a massive show of force in the Caribbean Sea, including deploying the USS Gerald Ford, the largest and most lethal carrier in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since September, the U.S. has\u00a0launched at least 20 strikes<\/a>\u00a0on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean Sea, killing more than 80 people. But the administration has offered no public evidence to prove they were actually smuggling drugs.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Trump administration claims Maduro is responsible for trafficking drugs into the U.S. Maduro has denied any ties to the drug trade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Trump administration has formally added Maduro and his government to the State Department’s list of the world’s most dangerous terrorist organizations<\/a>. Trump claims that gives him the authority to strike inside Venezuela, though many legal experts dispute that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This comes as Trump has pardoned the former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, who was convicted by a U.S. federal court of actively participating in the drug trade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sen. Tim Kaine, who has criticized the Trump administration’s Caribbean campaign, called the decision to pardon the former Honduran president “a disgusting and incomprehensible decision by Trump, and Americans whose lives have been destroyed by narcotraffickers like … Hern\u00e1ndez deserve better.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n