- Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores are appearing in federal court in New York City Thursday as he tries to have his drug trafficking indictment thrown out.
- The couple was captured in Caracas over two months ago during a US military operation, with Maduro declaring himself a “prisoner of war” and innocent. Maduro and top officials in his administration are accused of steering a massive cocaine trafficking operation from Venezuela to the United States.
- Currently jailed in Brooklyn, their court appearance was met with opposing rallies outside the courthouse, reflecting divided public opinion both in the US and Venezuela, where Maduro is being gradually sidelined.
- The anti-Maduro contingent waved a sign reading “Maduro rot in prison” while on the other side of a metal barrier, people held signs reading “Free President Maduro.”
- The couple has spent more than 80 days in separate units at Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal jail that has detained other high-profile inmates including Jeffrey Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell, as well as hip-hop’s Sean “Diddy” Combs.
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