US to provide Venezuela with satellite images of earthquake-hit areas

The United States will provide Venezuela with satellite imagery of areas affected by the recent earthquake to help assess the extent of the damage and support recovery planning efforts, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has stated.

During his Middle East tour, in Manama, Bahrain, he said the US is also assisting them with some aerial and space-based reconnaissance imagery, particularly of coastal areas where the extent of the damage is not yet fully clear, Caliber.Az reports, citing the US Department of State.

Rubio further noted that the transportation of aid supplies and specialists from the United States to Venezuela would be handled primarily by the Pentagon.

“The airport there is badly damaged, so we’ll have to rely on the Department of War to deploy assets there.  And then we’re also helping them with some overhead imagery, especially in coastal areas, where they don’t have full visibility over what the damage has been and what the impact has been,” the secretary of state added.

By Bakhtiyar Abbasov