The US pointman on Venezuela on Monday accused the EU of dragging its feet over sanctions, saying Europe was becoming a playground for President Nicolas Maduro's cadres and their mistresses and children. Elliott Abrams, US special representative on Venezuela, said the EU's reluctance to sanction more members of the Venezuelan regime was "unhelpful". He criticised the bloc's incoming foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell for accusing Washington of behaving like a "cowboy" in the crisis-wracked South American state.

The EU currently has asset freezes and travel bans in place against 18 Venezuelan ministers and officials but Abrams said the bloc needed to do more to put pressure on Maduro and his associates. "A far greater number of people from the regime are now using Europe as a kind of resort area," Abrams told reporters in Brussels, where he was due meet EU officials.

"They send their families here, their wives, their mistresses, their children. Their bank accounts are here. We have repeated information about the mansions they buy, the nightclubbing of their teenage children. That should not be happening."

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2019