Evizda

After the U.S.-backed attempt to overthrow elected Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro by force fizzled out, the Trump administration on Monday moved to further strangle the Latin American nation’s economy by imposing a full economic embargo.

President Donald Trump’s executive order targeting Venezuela, according to the Washington Post, “blocks all property and assets of the government and its officials, and prohibits any transactions with them, including the Venezuelan Central Bank and the state oil company.”

“The action puts Venezuela on par with Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Syria, the only other countries under a similar full embargo,” the Post reported.

Journalist and filmmaker Dan Cohen described the embargo as “economic terrorism”:

The Venezuelan economy has already been crippled by sweeping U.S. sanctions, which the Trump administration has expanded over the past several months in an attempt to overthrow Maduro and install opposition leader Juan Guaidó.

As Common Dreams reported in April, a study published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) found that Trump’s sanctions against Venezuela killed more than 40,000 people between 2017 and 2018.

“The sanctions are depriving Venezuelans of lifesaving medicines, medical equipment, food, and other essential imports,” wrote CEPR’s Mark Weisbrot, a co-author of the study. “This is illegal under U.S. and international law, and treaties that the U.S. has signed. Congress should move to stop it.”