In the spring of 2019, Russia sent hundreds of operators to Venezuela to support the regime of Nicolás Maduro, on whose resignation the United States insisted. In parallel, Moscow made it clear to Washington that they were ready to end their support for them, but only in exchange for Ukraine.

In the spring of 2019, Russia sent hundreds of "operators" to Venezuela to support the regime of Nicolás Maduro, on whose resignation the United States insisted. At the same time, Moscow made it clear to Washington that they were ready to end their support for them, but only in exchange for Ukraine.

"The Russians [...] were signaling very strongly that they wanted to somehow make some very strange swap arrangement between Venezuela and Ukraine: [...] You want us out of your backyard [...]We have our own version of this. You're in our backyard in Ukraine. And we were getting that sent to us, kind of informally through channels. It was in the Russian press, various commentators,” says Fiona Hill at the U.S. Congress.

A former intelligence officer and later a diplomat, she served as the Senior Director of the U.S. National Security Council specializing in Russian and European affairs for the last two years. On November 21, Hill testified publicly in Congress as part of an investigation into the impeachment of President Donald Trump. And on October 14, the diplomat spoke at a closed session of Congress. The transcript of the speech was published on the website of the Intelligence Committee.