Three months after his capture

(New York) Deposed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro appeared smiling Thursday in a New York court, where he did not speak, for his second public appearance since his spectacular capture by the United States.

During debates which lasted barely more than an hour, the judge responsible for the case indicated that he did not intend to accede to a request to drop the proceedings from his lawyers, around a question relating to the payment of their fees.

Prosecuted for drug trafficking alongside his wife Cilia Flores, 69, the former strongman of Venezuela, 63, appeared relaxed, smiling, in his gray prison uniform, taking notes, chatting with his lawyers via an interpreter, glancing at the press benches.

Extracted well before dawn from Brooklyn prison where they have been detained since January 3, he and his wife joined the federal court in the southern district of Manhattan, in front of which a few dozen opponents and supporters gathered early in the morning.

“We are desperately looking for the slightest form of justice for everything we have been through,” Carlos Egana, a 30-year-old Venezuelan educator, brandished a grimacing mannequin bearing the likeness of Nicolás Maduro, told AFP. “And the fact that this is happening, whether here in the United States or elsewhere, is a reason to celebrate.”

Not far from them, activists from small left-wing organizations brandish signs hostile to Donald Trump’s policies: “From Venezuela to Iran, enough sanctions and bombs! “.

A brief scuffle broke out in the morning between members of the two groups.

At the same time in Caracas, several hundred supporters of the former president gathered in Simon Bolivar Square, in the center of the city, to support him.

Violation of the rights of the defense

Present on site, the son of the former leader, MP Nicolás Maduro Guerra, expressed his “confidence in the legal system of the United States”, while affirming that according to him his father benefited from “immunity” due to his status.

While Nicolás Maduro and his wife plead not guilty, their lawyers have requested a dismissal of the indictment, arguing that the US administration is preventing the Venezuelan state from paying their costs due to international sanctions weighing on their country.

According to them, this is a violation of a right guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment to the American Constitution. On the contrary, the prosecution believes that the couple has enough resources to pay for it themselves.

“I am not going to abandon the prosecution,” judge Alvin Hellerstein responsible for the case told them, without giving a new hearing date.

Nicolás Maduro has not spoken since a first hearing before the same court on January 5, during which he and his wife were formally charged.

Combative, he then presented himself as “the president of the Republic of Venezuela” in office, “kidnapped” by the United States, defining himself from then on as a “prisoner of war”.

Speaking to the press on Thursday during a meeting at the White House, Donald Trump declared that “other cases will be brought before the courts” against the former head of state, without giving further details.

Since his arrival on American soil on January 3, Nicolás Maduro and his wife have been incarcerated at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn, a federal prison known for its unsanitary conditions and poor management.

Alone in his cell, without access to the internet and newspapers, the man some of his fellow inmates call “the president” reads the Bible, according to those around him.

Prosecuted in the United States on four counts, including narcoterrorism, the former head of state is accused of having protected and promoted vast drug trafficking, in particular by allying himself with guerrilla movements and criminal cartels considered “terrorist” by Washington.

His wife faces three charges.

Since the couple’s capture, the former bus driver who succeeded Hugo Chavez and led the country for 12 years was forced to give way to his vice-president, Delcy Rodríguez.

The latter has since multiplied concessions and gestures of appeasement towards the United States, while Donald Trump repeatedly repeats that it is he who now de facto leads the country from Washington.