Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said his security forces prevented a “false flag operation” to plant explosives at the United States Embassy in the capital Caracas in order to heighten tensions with Washington amid a US military build-up off the coast of the Latin American country.

In a televised interview late on Monday, Maduro said two reliable sources, one domestic and one international, had informed the government of the possible attack by “extremist sectors of the local Venezuelan right” and security forces were sent to reinforce the embassy.

The sources “agreed on the possibility that a local terrorist group placed an explosive device at the US embassy in Caracas”, Maduro said.

“This was backed by a person who will be known soon and asked for by a person who will be known soon

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