CARACAS – President Hugo Chavez said on Sunday U.S. “uncrewed aircraft” coming from Colombia allegedly entered Venezuela’s air space on espionage tasks and he ordered the security forces to “shoot them down.”

“A few days ago, at midnight, one of their aircraft without a crew penetrated up to the Fuerte Mara (in the western border state of Zulia), the soldiers saw it, they called the officer of the guard, he came, but it left, the plane disappeared,” said Chavez on his Sunday radio and television show “Alo Presidente.”

It was “a small airplane, two or three meters (yards) long, they operated it by remote control, but (the drone aircraft) film everything, they even drop bombs. That is Yankee technology. Last night, I ordered: any little aircraft of those that appear, bring it down!” he added.

The dispatch of drone aircraft like this constitutes “an act of war,” the Venezuelan president added, and he asked his Colombian counterpart, Alvaro Uribe, to act “responsibly” and avoid being used by Washington to “attack” Venezuela.

Chavez once again complained that the United States is “using Colombia” and “moving aircraft into Aruba and Curacao” allegedly to “prepare an attack” against his so-called socialist Bolivarian “revolution.”

“I warn ... the international community that the attacks against Venezuela are increasing and the preparations are clear,” Chavez said.

Chavez last Thursday accused The Netherlands of collaborating with the United States on a plan to attack Venezuela.

He claimed that the Caribbean islands of “Aruba and Curacao, which belong to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, have permitted the installation of U.S. military teams on their territory, placing Venezuela in the sights of the Americans.”

One day later, the Dutch government called Chavez’s complaint unfounded and announced that its foreign minister, Maxime Verhagen, would request an explanation from Venezuela’s ambassador to The Netherlands concerning the matter.

Chavez also accused Uribe of “placing military units on the border, believing that that will frighten us” and said Bogota is “threatening that they’re going to come here to capture some guerrillas that they say we are protecting, which is absolutely false.”

He also claimed that Colombia “is putting paramilitaries into Venezuela” and also intelligence “agents,” who are “seeking information supported by the (opposition members) here.”