Caracas
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A CNN team witnessed several explosions and heard the sounds of aircraft early Saturday in the Venezuelan capital Caracas, and reported that some areas of the city were without electricity.
Venezuela’s government condemned what it said was a “very serious grave military aggression” by the US against multiple parts of the country after the explosions were reported in Caracas and other locations.
It accused the US of carrying out an attack on Caracas and the states of Miranda, Aragua and La Guaira, and said President Nicolás Maduro had signed a state of emergency and ordered all national defense plans to be implemented “at the appropriate time and under the appropriate circumstances.”
CNN has reached out to the White House, the State Department, the Pentagon and US Southern Command for comment on the explosions. The Pentagon and Southern Command referred enquiries to the White House.
The White House has not yet responded to CNN’s request.
The first blast witnessed by the CNN team was recorded at approximately 1.50am local time (0.50aET).
“One was so strong, my window was shaking after it,” CNNE correspondent Osmary Hernandez said.
Several areas of the city were without power and CNN journalists in the Venezuelan capital could hear sound of aircraft after the explosions.
The cause of the explosions was unclear.
One video obtained and verified by CNN showed two plumes of smoke rising into the night sky amid city lights. An orange glow can be seen at the base of one of the plumes. Then a flash in another location is briefly seen, followed by a dull booming sound.
Venezuelan news outlets Efecto Cocuyo and Tal Cual Digital reported explosions were also heard in La Guaira state north of Caracas and on the country’s coast, and at Higuerote, a city on the coast in Miranda state.
The president of neighboring Colombia called for the United Nations to “meet immediately” following the reports of the explosions.
“They are bombing with missiles,” Gustavo Petro wrote on X. “The OAS (Organization of American States) and the UN (United Nations) must meet immediately.”
Petro did not specify how he knew bombing had occurred. He did not specify who ‘they’ were.
US President Donald Trump has repeatedly warned that the US is preparing to take new action against alleged drug trafficking networks in Venezuela and that strikes on land will start “soon.”
Trump’s pressure campaign on Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has included strikes destroying more than 30 boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean in what the US has described as a counter-narcotics campaign. Trump last month ordered a blockade of sanctioned oil tankers coming to and leaving Venezuela.
The CIA carried out a drone strike in December on a port facility on the coast of Venezuela, CNN reported last month, citing sources, marking the first known US attack on a target inside that country.
Trump last month said the United States took out a “big facility” as part of a pressure campaign against Venezuela, but when pressed by reporters on December 29, he declined to say whether the US military or an entity like the CIA was behind the operation.
During a Christmas Eve phone call to troops aboard the USS Gerald Ford, which Trump recently ordered deployed to the Caribbean Sea, Trump called the region an “interesting place” to be and said the US would be “going after the land.”
Trump in October said that he authorized the CIA to operate inside Venezuela to clamp down on illegal flows of migrants and drugs from the South American nation.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
Alejandra Jaramillo, Isaac Yee, Michael Rios, and Laura Sharman contributed to this report
