by WILL COOPER
Special contributor
NEW YORK, (CAJ News) – WORLD—RENOWNED economist and United Nations adviser Professor Jeffrey Sachs delivered a blistering denunciation of recent United States military actions against Venezuela during an emergency UN Security Council session this week, warning that Washington’s conduct represents a dangerous retreat from the rules-based international order and a descent into “the law of the jungle.”
Sachs, president of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, told the Security Council that the U.S. raid that led to the KIDNAPPING and removal of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife constitutes “imperial madness” and violates Article 2, Section 4 of the UN Charter, which prohibits the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.
“If the UN Charter no longer restrains Washington, then the world is already back to jungle logic, only with nuclear weapons,” Sachs warned.
“Peace, and the survival of humanity, depends on whether the United Nations Charter remains a living instrument of international law, or is allowed to wither into irrelevance.”
Sachs’s remarks drew applause from several member states that echoed concerns about U.S. violations of international law, noting that the forcible seizure of a sitting head of state and the use of unilateral sanctions and military force undermines democracy, human rights, and the international rule of law.
At the session, China’s deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, Sun Lei, denounced the U.S. military action as “unilateral, illegal, and bullying,” stressing that it disregards core principles of the UN Charter and poses a “grave threat to peace and security in Latin America and the Caribbean and even internationally.”
China urged the immediate release of President Maduro and his wife and called on Washington to engage in dialogue and respect the sovereignty of other nations.
Russia’s envoy Vassily Nebenzia also condemned the operation as “an act of armed aggression… in breach of all norms of international law,” warning that such conduct fuels “neocolonialism and imperialism” and signals a dangerous willingness by powerful nations to ignore established legal norms.
Iran joined the chorus of criticism, calling the assault a “flagrant violation” of Venezuela’s sovereignty and international law and warning that the precedent could embolden any superpower to violate the territorial integrity of weaker states at will.
South Africa’s acting deputy permanent representative, Jonathan Passmoor, echoed these fears, stating that “failure to act decisively against such violations is tantamount to inviting anarchy and normalizing the use of force and military might as the main discourse in international politics.”
Across Latin America, condemnation was similarly strong.
Colombia’s UN ambassador, Leonor Zalabata Torres, emphasised that defending sovereignty and territorial integrity “is not an option. Indeed, it is a common obligation… to preserve international peace and security.”
Human rights advocates and legal experts have raised alarm as well, noting that beyond military incursions, the U.S. has applied sweeping economic sanctions, extraterritorial legal actions, and seizures of Venezuelan assets and tankers, measures that critics say resemble coercive resource extraction more than lawful enforcement.
Venezuela possesses some of the world’s largest proven oil reserves, and analysts warn that moves to control those resources by force risk igniting broader geopolitical conflict.
The global backlash also highlights fears that if the actions go unchallenged, powerful states could feel emboldened to threaten or intervene in other mineral-rich but politically weaker nations — including Colombia, Cuba, Iran, Greenland and parts of Africa — with impunity, undermining the sovereign right of peoples everywhere to determine their own futures without foreign interference.
Critics argue that such behavior erodes trust in international institutions, weakens human rights protections, and incentivises a world where the strongest dictate terms to the weakest.
Without adherence to internationally agreed norms, they contend, the last century’s hard-won principles of peaceful coexistence and legal equality among states risk being swept aside.
As Venezuela’s Maduro pleaded not guilty in a U.S. federal court this week and world leaders continue to debate the legality of the operation, the Security Council remains divided.
But the chorus of denunciations underscores a shared concern: that the unchecked use of force by any superpower endangers not just one nation but the very foundations of global peace, stability and justice.
— CAJ News