Venezuela shoots down 2 hostile planes

Venezuela says two light aircraft have been shot down after entering the country's airspace over the weekend. The Bolivarian Armed Forces said that these were the first mid-air attacks by fighter jets since a bill authorising such action against illegal planes was approved earlier this month, according to the (BBC). The aircraft were allegedly smuggling drugs from Central America and refused to follow the military pilots' orders. The two incidents suggest the Venezuelan government is stepping up its efforts to prevent drug-trafficking flights over its airspace, particularly since Venezuela's President Maduro issued a public warning to drug smugglers After the approval of the airspace bill, earlier in October, Maduro threatened "international narco-traffickers". "Any plane entering Venezuela is going to be obliged to land in peace. If not, it will be brought down by our Sukhoi jets, our F-16s and by all of the Venezuelan military aviation," he said. The head of Venezuela's Strategic Operational Centre, General Vladimir Padrino Lopez, told the country's state television that a plane had been targeted after "all other means of persuasion had been exhausted" in the early hours of Saturday. "These are drug trafficking mafias which intend to use our country as a platform for drug distribution, trespassing our airspace," the head of the National Anti-Drugs Agency, Alejandro Keleris Bucarito said.