Defend homeland if US dares to touch Venezuela: Maduro

By Muhammed Emin Canik and Vakkas Dogantekin

CARACAS, Venezuala (AA) - Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday called on his military to be "ready" against a U.S. military offensive.

Maduro spoke to the troops during a visit to a military training center in the state of Cojedes, accompanied by Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez.

Maduro called on the military "to be ready to defend the homeland with weapons in hands if one day the U.S. empire dares to touch this land, this sacred soil."

He added that the "United States wants to colonize the Latin America and the Caribbean region, using the Monroe Doctrine."

Maduro's order to army came amid a new tension when Venezuela's self-proclaimed interim president has urged his supporters to take to streets on Saturday for more protests to topple country's elected leader, Nicolas Maduro.

Known as the Monroe Doctrine since former U.S. President James Monroe's 1823 address to Congress on the new political order developing in the rest of the Americas and the role of Europe in the Western Hemisphere, Monroe’s declaration provided precedent and support for U.S. expansion on the American continent.