During a hearing today before federal judge Alvin Hellerstein in New York, the constitutional president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, pleaded not guilty to new charges filed in the United States.

In defending his innocence, Maduro stated that the U.S. prosecution's allegations of conspiracy to commit torture are based on false accusations and testimony.

"It is a sum of allegations already presented previously of false accusations," the leader emphasized, noting that he read the accusatory document and rejects it entirely.

For her part, Flores told Judge Hellerstein that she is completely innocent. "I am not guilty," emphasized the Venezuelan lawmaker, up until the moment on January 3, during a U.S. military attack on her country, when she and her husband were kidnapped and transferred to a detention center in New York.

At the hearing, the magistrate accepted a request submitted by the prosecution and the defense of the accused to postpone the start of the trial by two weeks, in order to have more time for the presentation of prior motions, for which the originally scheduled date of June 1, 2027, was rescheduled for the 14th of the same month.

The next hearing for Maduro and Flores will take place on December 17, at which time they must decide the defense's position on immunity.

According to local media reports, Maduro raised his hand upon leaving the courtroom and bid farewell to the judge with a gesture.

Last week, Judge Hellerstein himself denied Flores, who turns 70 on this October 15, house arrest while awaiting trial, despite the defense's argument of the deterioration of her health, especially heart problems, which have worsened since she has been in custody.

Maduro and Flores were formally indicted by a federal grand jury in January in relation to charges associated with drug trafficking, of which both also pleaded not guilty.

The U.S. Government now seeks to link both of them to what it described as the unlawful detention of more than a dozen U.S. citizens in Venezuelan prisons. The prosecution also maintains that the current Venezuelan administration, headed by acting President Delcy Rodríguez, has never demanded through diplomatic channels the release of Nicolás Maduro or Cilia Flores. Nor have they demanded their immunity so that they would not be tried in the United States.

More than one hundred people died in the U.S. military operation, including 32 Cubans.