More than 50 countries around the world do not recognize Nicolás Maduro as the rightful ​president.

Axar.az informs U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio stated this during an interview with Gillian Turner of Fox News.

"He’s not the president of Venezuela. That’s a title he’s given himself. And that’s not just us saying it. That was – by the way, that was the policy of the Biden administration, and that was the policy of the first Trump Administration, and that’s the policy of 50-something countries, including multiple countries in the region, do not recognize him as the president of that country.

What he is, is someone who’s empowered himself of some of the instruments of government and are using that to operate a drug cartel from Venezuelan territory, much of that drugs aimed at reaching the United States. So we’re not going to have a cartel, operating or masquerading as a government, operating in our own hemisphere.

He’s indicted. He’s a fugitive of American justice. There’s a reward out for his capture. And by the way, related to that, the President of the United States made clear that he’s not going to allow cartels, that cartel or any other cartel, to operate with impunity in our hemisphere and send drugs towards the United States. And he’s going to use the U.S. military and all the elements of American power to target cartels who are targeting America," he said.