Opposition leader María Machado returns from exile to a Venezuela reshaped by Trump
Machado returns with Trump's blessing, even if Washington is happy with Venezuela's existing leader - at least for the time being.
Driving down roads lined with jubilant supporters from the western state of Lara to the capital Caracas, Maria Corina Machado's return to Venezuela could hardly have been more different to her exit 10 months earlier.
Colourful, loud, open and defiant, it stood in stark contrast to the way the Venezuelan opposition leader slipped out of the country in the dead of night in December last year to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo.
She had been unable to make it back to her homeland until now, thwarted on several occasions by the Venezuelan government - and by the Trump administration, which insisted the "time wasn't right" for her return.
"The return of Maria Corina Machado, in my personal view, is the most significant [political] event since 3rd January," says Alarcon. "It means the most important political leader in Venezuela is back in the country."