STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
This network sends correspondents to get a firsthand view of events, and today we have a report from inside Venezuela.
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Two months ago, U.S. forces swooped into Caracas and seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife. Since then, the relationship between the U.S. and Venezuela seems to be on a very fast mend. The two countries have made oil deals. They're now talking critical minerals and have agreed to reestablish diplomatic relations.
INSKEEP: NPR's Eyder Peralta is in the country. Hey there, Eyder.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning, Steve.
INSKEEP: What's it feel like to be in Venezuela?
PERALTA: It is absolutely surreal because you land at the airport, and the signs are in Spanish, Russian, Arabic and Chinese, which tells you just where this country was facing a few months ago. And then you go out on the streets, and people here tell you that they feel like a weight has been lifted. For the first time in a long time, there are street protests. Opposition groups are holding public meetings. I was at the Justice Department building yesterday, and there was a group of protesters calling for all political prisoners to be released. Venezuela has passed an amnesty law, but it excluded anyone who called for a foreign intervention.
And I met Edward Ocariz there, and he's a former political prisoner. He has faced the wrath of this government. But then, right there in public, he taunted the government. They call us traitors, he said, but look at them now.
EDWARD OCARIZ: (Speaking Spanish).
PERALTA: "Now, it's them who are not only kneeling," he's saying, "but sleeping with the United States."
And to be clear, he thinks the U.S. intervention was regrettable, but he also thinks that something good came out of it, and that allows him to say this in public without being thrown back in prison.
INSKEEP: Is that the only point of view you've been hearing?
PERALTA: No. I mean, yesterday was also the 13th anniversary of the death of former President Hugo Chavez, and so hundreds of people came to pay their respects at his burial ground. And in the middle of this crowd was this guy playing the guitar.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Singing in Spanish) Yankee, go home. Yankee, go home. Yankee, go home.
PERALTA: And he is singing, Yankee, go home. It was pure defiance at Chavez's tomb, but, of course, this is happening at almost the exact time that Chavez's own party was sitting at the presidential palace cutting deals with U.S. officials.
INSKEEP: Wow. And the American secretary of the interior is visiting. How's that going?
PERALTA: I suppose it could've been awkward because Interior Secretary Doug Burgum sat for a meeting right in front of Venezuelan Interior Secretary Diosdado Cabello, and that is the man who is wanted in the U.S. for narcoterrorism. In fact, they're still offering $25 million for his capture. But what we saw instead were lots of smiles. Burgum ignored questions about Cabello or democracy, and he made clear that this is about business. The interim Venezuelan government has passed laws that make it easier for U.S. oil companies to do business here, and Burgum says that they're about to do the same for the mining sector. And he explained the real politics at play here.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DOUG BURGUM: One of the highest strategic national security threats to any democratic nation right now is China's control of critical minerals.
PERALTA: And those are the minerals in your laptop, for example, and he says Venezuela likely has those minerals. American companies would like to extract them, and Venezuela could suddenly become key in helping the U.S. break reliance on China, a win-win he called it. And yesterday, Trump said, quote, "Venezuela is working." Once again, he was framing it as the model for regime change.
INSKEEP: OK. NPR's Eyder Peralta reporting from Caracas, Venezuela, with sounds on the streets. Thanks.
PERALTA: Thank you, Steve. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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