Over a month before the US launched a nighttime operation and captured President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, the US had designated Cartel de los Soles or Cartel of the Suns, allegedly headed by Maduro, as a foreign terrorist organisation (FTO).
"The Department of State intends to designate Cartel de los Soles as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO), effective November 24, 2025. Based in Venezuela, the Cartel de los Soles is headed by Nicolás Maduro and other high-ranking individuals of the illegitimate Maduro regime who have corrupted Venezuela’s military, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary. Neither Maduro nor his cronies represent Venezuela’s legitimate government," a statement from the US Department of State said on November 16.
"Cartel de los Soles by and with other designated FTOs, including Tren de Aragua and the Sinaloa Cartel are responsible for terrorist violence throughout our hemisphere as well as for trafficking drugs into the United States and Europe. The United States will continue using all available tools to protect our national security interests and deny funding and resources to narco-terrorists," it added.
This was part of the US administration's efforts to combat drug trafficking into the country, as the US alleges that the organisation is responsible for drug trafficking to the US and Europe.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio had accused Cartel de los Soles of being “responsible for terrorist violence” in the Western Hemisphere.
In the 1990s, Venezuelans started using the term Cartel de los Soles to refer to high-ranking military officers who had become wealthy through drug trafficking.
As corruption later spread across the country—first during the presidency of the late Hugo Chavez and then under Nicolas Maduro—the term came to be used more broadly to include police and government officials, as well as illicit activities such as illegal mining and fuel smuggling.
The “suns” in the name refer to the insignia worn on the epaulettes of high-ranking military uniforms.
The term gained greater prominence in 2020, when the US Justice Department, during Donald Trump’s first term, accused President Maduro and members of his inner circle of leading a drug-trafficking network, announcing indictments on narcoterrorism and related charges.
“It is not a group,” said Adam Isaacson, director for defence oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America. “It’s not like a group that people would ever identify themselves as members of. They don’t have regular meetings. They don’t have a hierarchy.”
