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A Venezue­lan of­fi­cial is sug­gest­ing that Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo’s re­cent call for diplo­ma­cy should be di­rect­ed square­ly at the Unit­ed States, as the world’s largest air­craft car­ri­er ar­rived close to the coun­try’s bor­ders.

The USS Ger­ald R Ford en­tered Caribbean wa­ters on Sun­day, join­ing eight war­ships, a nu­clear sub­ma­rine, F-35 air­craft and hun­dreds of mil­i­tary per­son­nel. Its ar­rival comes as US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump re­fus­es to rule out de­ploy­ing troops to Venezuela, even while in­sist­ing he re­mains open to talks with Pres­i­dent Nicolás Maduro.

The Venezue­lan of­fi­cial, who spoke with Guardian Me­dia via What­sApp on the con­di­tion of anonymi­ty, was re­spond­ing to re­marks Kan­ga­loo de­liv­ered at the An­nu­al Heads of Mis­sions Din­ner on No­vem­ber 5.