"Regime is continuing without any change," Tharoor says on Venezuela

Addressing reporters here, Tharoor said that as an interim president has taken over, the regime is continuing without any changes.

"Now, Venezuela, we've seen a very curious situation where the head of the government has been removed and taken away, but that the regime is continuing without any change. All the ministers, the National Assembly, the government, the interim president is the former vice president, the security forces, everything is under control. So it is literally a decapitation, but not a change of regime," he said.

Tharoor said that the regime change is not to bring about democracy, but as Trump has opely said it is for oil.

"It's the same regime that's continued. And in those circumstances, it does look as if this change of government was brought about without any talk of democracy or any of those usual things we're used to hearing from Washington when such changes happen. Instead, he has said very openly it's about the oil, the only area that Americans have asserted control over is Venezuela and oil, American oil companies and so on, we'll have to see how this plays out,' he said.

Tharoor also said that although activist, Maria Corina Machado has given her Nobel prize to Trump, it holds no interest for her.

"We know that the Nobel Peace laureate from Venezuela, who is a democracy activist, Maria Corina Machado, she was in the White House and she handed over her peace medal to Mr. Trump as a tribute, but there's also an implicit transaction there. Please try and help our side of the matter. He has made statements implying that he doesn't believe in it as much support for that," he said.

Tharoor noted that the Venezuelan incident is quite unprecedented.

"But in due course, I think it's difficult to imagine that there can't be elections that are more free and fair in which everyone can participate, with this kind of American overshadow, overseeing of the Venezuelan process. So for the moment, it seems to be minimal change, only at the top and with oil headed over to the Americans. In due course, we'll have to see where this ends. But it's certainly a very unusual situation. No one has ever seen anything like this in the recent history of the world," he said.

Trump on Friday (local time) said that Venezuela has offered Washington "50 million barrels of oil" worth USD 5.2 billion, and he has agreed to that deal.

Addressing the press on the renaming of Southern Boulevard to Donald J Trump Boulevard, Trump said, "We're dealing with the new President. We're dealing with a lot of the people who are running the country...They said, we have 50 million barrels of oil, and we have to get it processed immediately because we have no room. Will you take it? I said, we'll take it. It's equivalent to USD 5.2 billion." (ANI)