Israeli attacks leave at least 20 dead in Gaza
By Rodrigo Santos Andrade
Weeks after President Donald Trump pardoned a former Honduran leader sentenced to prison on cocaine distribution charges, the US captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife in an overnight military operation on Jan. 3, President Donald Trump said, as U.S. airstrikes rocked Caracas and targets across the country.
Maduro and his wife are both named in a federal indictment accusing them of narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy and two illegal weapons counts. Before he was pardoned, former Honduras president Juan Orlando Hernández was convicted in March of 2024.
Federal officials said Hernandez used bribes from drug-trafficking organizations to "fuel his rise" and then provided "support and protection for his co-conspirators, allowing them to move mountains of cocaine, commit acts of violence and murder, and help turn Honduras into one of the most dangerous countries in the world."
He was "at the center of one of the largest and most violent drug-trafficking conspiracies in the world," helping to bring more than 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S., the Justice Department said in a news release last year after his conviction.
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