US hostage negotiator who worked with Nicolas Maduro says he was not a ‘bloodthirsty maniac’

WASHINGTON, DC: Former US hostage negotiator Roger Carstens, who worked closely with ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, offered an unexpected perspective on the socialist leader. 

In an interview, Carstens said that, based on his personal experience, he never viewed Maduro as a bloodthirsty maniac but rather as a pragmatic leader.

Roger Carstens' perspective on Nicolas Maduro

Roger Carstens, who worked with Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro to secure the release of Americans held in Venezuela, told '60 Minutes' on Sunday that he did not view Maduro as a “bloodthirsty maniac.”

Carstens helped convince Maduro to release 20 American hostages and came to know the Venezuelan leader during his five years as Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs.

“The administration would paint Maduro as a bloodthirsty d*ug dealer,” Scott Pelley said. “Is that the man you knew?”

“I don’t think so,” Carstens responded. “On one way I could say I’m not naive to the crimes that were committed by the regime writ large. And if you are the president of a country, you, of course, have responsibility for what’s…happening in your government.”

Carstens continued, “On the flip side, I would say that being the person in the room with President Maduro, my job was to get Americans back, and that’s best done by building a very human relationship.”

“And in doing so, I didn’t find him to be a bloodthirsty maniac. I found him to be a practical person. Someone who wanted to find ways to solve the problems that were faced by his country.”

Roger Carstens' reaction to Nicolas Maduro's capture

Roger Carstens said he was not very surprised to learn that US forces had captured Nicolas Maduro.

“In a way, I wasn’t shocked,” Carstens said.

“I think probably as soon as August or September, in watching the early military moves and the diplomatic moves take place, it seemed that unless he were willing to make some sort of deal or accommodation with the United States, I felt the possibility of Delta Force showing up at 2 am was very real.”

CIA intelligence aided Delta Force in Nicolas Maduro capture

Maduro’s arrest followed a dramatic raid conducted by US special operations forces, who apprehended him at what officials described as a heavily fortified residence in Venezuela. According to sources briefed on the operation, the home was designed more like a military compound than a civilian dwelling.

Following his capture, Maduro was charged with a sweeping list of federal offenses, including narco-terrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation conspiracy, possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices against the United States.

A US official confirmed that the arrest was carried out by the Army’s Delta Force, while intelligence used to track Maduro’s movements was provided by the Central Intelligence Agency to the Department of War.