Two Russian air force planes landed at Venezuela's main airport on Saturday carrying a Russian defence official and nearly 100 troops, according to media reports, amid strengthening ties between Caracas and Moscow.
A flight-tracking website showed that two planes left from a Russian military airport bound for Caracas on Friday, and another flight-tracking site showed that one plane left Caracas on Sunday.
That comes three months after the two nations held military exercise s on Venezuelan soil that President Nicolas Maduro called a sign of strengthening relations, but which Washington criticized as Russian encroachment in the region.
The flights carried officials who arrived to "exchange consultations," wrote Russian government-owned news agency Sputnik, which quoted an unnamed source at the Russian embassy.
"Russia has various contracts that are in the process of being fulfilled, contracts of a technical military character," Sputnik quoted the source as saying.