YOUTUBE terminated Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s account this weekend, amid rising tensions between Venezuela and the US over the deployment of US warships and fighter jets in the southern Caribbean.

YouTube’s parent company Google has yet to comment on the termination, but anyone trying to access Venezuelan president’s channel receives a message saying: “This account has been terminated for a violation of YouTube’s terms of service.”

Mr Maduro’s YouTube account had more than 200,000 followers before it was terminated on Friday and was used to publish the Venezuelan president’s speeches, as well as clips from his weekly show on Venezuelan state TV.

On its website, YouTube says it eliminates accounts that commit “repeated violations of community guidelines” that include publishing misinformation, hate speech and content that “interferes with democratic processes.”

Mr Maduro has been widely accused of stealing last year’s presidential election in Venezuela, which, according to the US-backed opposition, he lost by a landslide.

In 2020, Mr Maduro was indicted by a federal court in New York where he has been charged with conspiring to traffic cocaine to the United States.

Recently, the US doubled a bounty payment for Mr Maduro’s capture to $50 million (£37.1m), with White House officials often referring to Mr Maduro as a drug cartel leader who must be brought to justice.

While Venezuela continues to sell oil to the United States and take deportation flights, relations between the two nations have worsened, with the deployment of eight US warships last month to an area of the southern Caribbean near Venezuela’s coast.

The Trump administration says the ships, which are fitted with long-range missiles and are also transporting a landing force of 2,000 marines, are on an anti-drug trafficking mission.

But Venezuela’s government has described the deployment as an attack on the nation’s sovereignty and part of an effort to overthrow Maduro’s government.

The US flotilla has destroyed three speedboats allegedly carrying drugs so far, according to the White House, killing more than a dozen people on board the small vessels.