US Denies Legacy of Overthrowing Governments

March 31, 2015
In February, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro arrested at least 11 people, including an air force general, whom Maduro says were involved in a plot to overthrow the government. “It is the government of the United States that is behind the plans of destabilization and coups against Venezuela,” said Maduro in a television address.

Following Obama’s interview, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov exited a Beijing meeting with Indian and Chinese counterparts. Lavrov told reporters, “[I]f anyone still needed a confirmation of the fact that the United States was directly involved from the very beginning in the coup that President Obama referred to using a neutral term ‘transfer of power,’ they now have it.”

In late 2013, the United States trained and armed rebels aiming to overthrow Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. In neighboring Jordan, the CIA trained one 50-person cell of such rebels, which soon after were to enter the besieged Mediterranean nation.

In May 2007, sources within the U.S. intelligence community told ABC News that the Bush administration ordered the CIA to manipulate Iran’s “currency and international financial transactions” to destabilize the Islamic republic.