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Akbar Novruz

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United States President Donald Trump said Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado will be coming to Washington DC next week, Azernews reports via The Guardian.

"I understand she's coming in next week sometime, and I look forward to saying hello to her, and I've heard that she wants to do that," Trump said on Fox News.

In the aftermath of that operation, the future governance of the South American country has remained an open question, with Trump over the weekend dismissing the idea of working with popular opposition leader Machado, saying “she doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country.”

But in a Fox News interview on Thursday, the US president said Machado was “coming in next week sometime,” adding that “I look forward to saying hello to her”.

Asked whether he would accept Machado’s Nobel Peace Prize if she gave it to him, Trump said: “I’ve heard that she wants to do that. That’d be a great honour.”

This will be Trump’s first meeting with Machado, who said earlier this week that she hadn’t spoken to the US president since she won the prize in October.

Trump has not publicly made the same offer to Delcy Rodríguez, Venezuela’s interim president, although in an interview with the New York Times on Wednesday, Trump said the US was “getting along very well” with the government of Rodríguez, and that they were “giving us everything that we feel is necessary”.

The White House did not immediately respond when reached for additional details on the Machado meeting.

On Thursday, Rodríguez’s government began releasing a “significant number” of political prisoners, including several foreigners, in an apparent concession to the US. Former Venezuelan opposition candidate Enrique Marquez was among those released.