M005-VENEZUELA MADURO PIDE PAZ

STORY: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro directly addressed mounting military pressure from the U.S. on his TV program on Monday (November 17), speaking in English.

"Dialogue, call, yes. Peace, yes. War, no. Never, never war", Maduro said on Monday, while facing the camera, reaffirmed Venezuela’s commitment to diplomacy and international law, while condemning the use of force or military threats.

Maduro stated that Venezuela would engage with any nation willing to talk, but warned against foreign aggression, citing a recent letter from an evangelical pastor that denounced the bombing of Christian communities.

President Donald Trump said on Monday he has not ruled out putting American forces on the ground in Venezuela, while expressing a willingness to hear directly from Nicolas Maduro regarding the Venezuelan leader's proposals to avert further U.S. military escalation.

The Pentagon said on Sunday (November 16) before Trump's latest comments that the U.S. Navy's largest aircraft carrier, the Gerald R. Ford, with 5,000 military personnel and dozens of warplanes on board, and its strike group moved into the Caribbean. That added to the eight warships, a nuclear submarine and F-35 aircraft already sent to the region.

So far, the Trump administration has focused its efforts on bombing boats allegedly carrying drugs that have departed from the shoreline of Venezuela and other Latin American countries.

Human rights groups have condemned those strikes as extrajudicial killings of civilians. The White House says the U.S. is at war with drug cartels and courts aren't needed in armed conflicts.