NEW YORK, Jan 4 (Reuters): Venezuela's toppled leader Nicolas Maduro was in a New York detention center on Sunday awaiting drug charges after President Donald Trump ordered an audacious raid to capture him, saying the US would take control of the oil-producing nation.
The image of the 63-year-old Maduro blindfolded and handcuffed en route to the U.S. has stunned Venezuelans and was Washington's most controversial intervention in Latin America since the invasion of Panama 37 years ago.
Maduro, who wished his captors a "Happy New Year" on arrival, is due to appear in a Manhattan court on Monday.
At home, his allies were still in charge and have denounced their leader's "kidnapping" as part of an imperialist oil grab.
Streets were far quieter than usual on Sunday as Venezuelans anxiously discussed what would come next. Some stocked up on essentials but many simply hunkered indoors.
"I've just taken the dog out and it feels like an abandoned city, people are shut inside," said Alejandra Palencia, 35, a psychologist in the city of Maracay.
"There is fear and uncertainty."
With memories of painful U.S. interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, many world leaders were staggered at Trump's move, even though Maduro's standing was low given his autocratic rule and substantial evidence of vote-rigging.
Trump said the U.S. would for now manage the South American nation of about 30 million people plus its oil reserves, the largest in the world. But he gave few details of how.
"We will run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition," he told a press conference at his Mar-a-Lago resort, hailing the extraordinary extraction of Maduro just as he was at the door of a safe room.
To the disappointment of Venezuela's opposition and diaspora, Trump has given short shrift to the idea of 58-year-old opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Corina Machado taking over, saying she lacked support.
Machado was banned from standing in Venezuela's 2024 election and has said her ally Edmundo Gonzalez, 76, who overwhelmingly won that vote according to the opposition and some international observers, should now take the presidency.
Once one of the most prosperous nations in Latin America, Venezuela's economy nosedived further under Maduro, sending about one in five Venezuelans abroad in one of the world's biggest exoduses.
