US carrying out strikes in Venezuela: Official
- Last updated: January 3, 2026 | 12:34 ..
The United States is carrying out strikes inside Venezuela, a US official told Reuters early on Saturday.
The official, who was speaking on the condition of anonymity, did not provide details.
At least seven explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard around 2am local time on Saturday in Venezuela's capital, Caracas. The government accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations in multiple states.
Pentagon referred requests for comment to the White House, which didn't immediately return an email seeking comment. Meanwhile, the Federal Aviation Administration has banned US commercial flights in Venezuelan airspace over "ongoing military activity" ahead of explosions in Caracas.
Calls to the US Southern Command, which oversees military operations in the region, went unanswered.
The explosions in Caracas occurred within less than 30 minutes. People in various neighborhoods rushed to the streets. while others took to social media to report hearing and seeing the blasts. Two hours later, various areas of the city remained without power, but vehicles continued to move freely.
Smoke could be seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas. Another military installation in the capital was without power.
"The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes," said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker, her voice trembling. She was walking briskly with two relatives, returning from a birthday party. "We felt like the air was hitting us."
Venezuela's government, in the statement, called on its supporters to take to the streets.
"People to the streets!" the statement said. "The Bolivarian Government calls on all social and political forces in the country to activate mobilization plans and repudiate this imperialist attack."
The statement added that President Nicolás Maduro had "ordered all national defense plans to be implemented" and declared "a state of external disturbance." That state of emergency gives him the power to suspend people's rights and expand the role of the armed forces.
The FAA's warning, known as "Notice to Airmen," came shortly after one in the morning on the east coast of the US It warned all commercial and private US pilots that the airspace over Venezuela and the small island nation of Curacao, just off the coast of the country to the north, was off-limits "due to safety-of-flight risks associated with ongoing military activity."
The warnings are designed to alert pilots to a variety of dangers.
Saturday's blasts come as the US military has been targeting, in recent days, alleged drug-smuggling boats. On Friday, Venezuela said it was open to negotiating an agreement with the US to combat drug trafficking.
Maduro also said in a pretaped interview aired Thursday that the US wants to force a government change in Venezuela and gain access to its vast oil reserves through the monthslong pressure campaign that began with a massive military deployment to the Caribbean Sea in August.
Maduro has been charged with narco-terrorism in the US The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels in what was the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the US began strikes on boats in September.
US President Donald Trump for months had threatened that he could soon order strikes on targets on Venezuelan land. The US has also seized sanctioned oil tankers off the coast of Venezuela, and Trump ordered a blockade of others in a move that seemed designed to put a tighter chokehold on the South American country's economy.
The US military has been attacking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean since early September. As of Friday, the number of known boat strikes is 35 and the number of people killed is at least 115, according to numbers announced by the Trump administration.
They followed a major buildup of American forces in the waters off South America, including the arrival in November of the nation's most advanced aircraft carrier, which added thousands more troops to what was already the largest military presence in the region in generations.
Trump has justified the boat strikes as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the US and asserted that the US is engaged in an "armed conflict" with drug cartels.
Meanwhile, Iranian state television reported on the explosions in Caracas on Saturday, showing images of the Venezuelan capital. Iran has been close to Venezuela for years, in part due to their shared enmity of the US.
Agencies