Venezuelan Army Reportedly Conducting Forced Conscriptions In Mining Regions Due To Low Voluntary Turnout

The Venezuela army is reportedly conducting forced conscriptions to the civilian militias due to low voluntary turnout and as tensions with the U.S: continue to escalate, with American assets deployed off the coast of the South American country.

Infobae reported on Thursday that the army will again sign up volunteers this weekend, and has already forcefully recruited people in states like Bolivar. "They are taking young people. They come in Army trucks and vans," a source told the outlet. Another person said people were taken off the street.

Maduro made the initial call last week, saying he was calling to arms to all militia members. Some high-profile advocates of the authoritarian government could be seen signing up at public squares and barracks during the weekend, but Infobae and other reporters claim that the initiative was actually a failure.

Maduro has also called on friendly countries to "unite" to defend its "right to sovereignty, peace and self-determination."

Speaking at an extraordinary ALBA-TCP summit last week, Maduro began with a call to "the national unity of all Venezuelans to guarantee peace with sovereignty, territorial integrity, self-determination of the peoples."

He then addressed the group's countries, saying "I dare, brothers of Latin America and the Caribbean, to call for the union of all rebel people, social movements, to defend Venezuela's right to sovereignty, peace, self-determination and its own development."

The country has also sent a letter to the UN asking for its support over what it described as "continued threats" from the United States.

Concretely, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil gave the letter to Gianluca Rampolla, UN official in the South American country. It claims that the country "strongly denounces the deployment, which is a grave threat to peace and security in the region."

"The presence of an offensive submarine in Latin America and the Caribbean contradicts our nations' historic commitment to disarming and the peaceful resolution of disputes, and represents a clear act of intimidation that is against the letter and spirit of the UN Charter," the letter adds.

The document ends with three requests: the end of the U.S. deployment, "clear and verifiable guarantees from the U.S. that it won't deploy nor threat to use nuclear weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean," and a conference attended by countries from the region regarding the most recent actions.