Toppled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro pleaded not guilty on Monday to narcotics charges after President Donald Trump's stunning capture of him rattled world leaders and left officials in Caracas scrambling to regroup.
"I am innocent. I am not guilty. I am a decent man. I am still president of my country," Maduro, 63, said through an interpreter, before being cut off by U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein in Manhattan federal court.
Maduro's wife Cilia Flores also pleaded not guilty. The next court date was set for March 17.
Dozens of protesters, both pro- and anti-Maduro, gathered outside the courthouse before the half-hour hearing. Reuters reported.
Hours later in Caracas, Maduro's vice president, Delcy Rodriguez, was sworn in as Venezuela's interim president with words of support for Maduro but no indication she would fight the U.S. move.
A recent U.S. intelligence assessment determined Rodriguez would be best positioned to lead a temporary government in Maduro's absence, finding that opposition figures such as Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Corina Machado or onetime presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez would struggle to gain legitimacy, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the classified report.
While many anti-Maduro activists had assumed this would be their moment, Trump appeared to have sidelined the Venezuelan opposition for now. Instead, he has suggested Rodriguez was willing to work with Washington.
In Caracas, senior officials from Maduro's 13-year-old government remain in charge of the South American oil producer of 30 million people, alternating between spitting defiance and possible cooperation with the Trump administration.
