PRAGMATIC ISSUES

The seizure of a foreign leader and plans for external governance violate core principles of international law and expose how quickly power can be substituted for process.

There Is No Legal Basis for America’s Seizure of Venezuela

Strip away the moral language and the Trump administration’s action in Venezuela collapses into something far simpler and far more troubling: a unilateral use of force without legal authority, international mandate, or allied consent.

Under international law, the United States has no jurisdiction over Venezuela. None. Sovereignty is not conditional on approval from Washington, nor does poor governance nullify a state’s legal existence.

The UN Charter is explicit.

States may not use force against another state except in self-defence against an armed attack, or with authorisation from the UN Security Council.

Neither condition is remotely satisfied here.

The administration’s preferred justification, humanitarian intervention, perhaps Trump should look inwards at his own humanitarian crisis before claiming to step into another country over it. Even its most permissive interpretations require multilateral support, proportionality, and a clearly articulated civilian protection mandate. What occurred instead was a targeted military operation to remove a head of state and announce plans for external governance. That is regime change. International law does not recognise regime change as a lawful objective.

Nor does the invocation of criminality provide cover. Allegations of narcotics trafficking or corruption, however serious, do not confer enforcement powers on foreign governments. Criminal jurisdiction does not cross borders by presidential decree. If it did, no leader would be safe from abduction by a rival power citing moral necessity.

The absence of allied backing is legally significant. Past humanitarian interventions, controversial as they were, relied on coalition frameworks to claim legitimacy. In this case, there is no NATO mandate, no EU consensus, no regional authorisation.

Silence from allies is not consent.

It is discomfort.

Without collective endorsement, the action becomes what international law has long warned against the substitution of power for process. A precedent whereby strong states decide when sovereignty applies and when it does not. Once accepted, that logic cannot be contained.

The domestic context compounds the illegality. A government accused of eroding due process, restricting protest, undermining judicial independence, and politicising enforcement agencies is poorly positioned to claim compliance with international human rights standards abroad. Legal credibility is cumulative. When it is depleted at home, it cannot be borrowed overseas.

Claims that the United States will “run” Venezuela expose the weakness of the legal argument rather than strengthen it. Occupation and administration of a foreign state requires explicit international authorisation. Anything else is control by force, not governance by law.

This is not a grey area.

It is a breach.

The danger is not merely that the United States acted unlawfully, but that it now treats law as optional. When a state with no mandate, no jurisdiction, and no allied consensus asserts the right to seize another nation and govern it, it is not advancing human rights. It is dismantling the rules that protect all states from exactly that behaviour. International law survives only when powerful countries obey it. When they do not, what follows is not order, but precedent, and precedent, once set, does not ask permission before returning home.