The Trump administration is doubling down on its policy to isolate Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, with national security adviser John Bolton dubbing the three countries the "Troika of Tyranny" on Thursday. 
 
 "In Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, we see the perils of poisonous ideologies left unchecked, and the dangers of domination and suppression," said Bolton in a Western Hemisphere policy speech at Miami Dade College’s National Historic Landmark Freedom Tower. 
 
 "The Troika of Tyranny in this Hemisphere — Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua — has finally met its match," he added. 
 
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 President Trump Donald John TrumpDem strategist says party's leaders struggle to relate to Americans Mexican president staying out of wall debate, calling it an internal US matter China vows to buy 'substantial amount' of American goods and services, US trade agency says MORE signed an executive order slapping sanctions on Venezuelan gold exports. It goes into effect midnight Thursday, Bolton said. 
 
 "The intent of going after the gold sector is to target those who are operating corruptly within the Venezuelan government, not those who are operating legitimately," a senior administration official told reporters Wednesday. 
 
 The administration's top goal in pairing Cuba and Venezuela is to build awareness of the communist island's role in propping up Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's government. 
 
 Bolton's priority is "to really unmask and tell the untold story about the very real and factual story of Cuban involvement in Venezuela," said another senior official. 
 
 Bolton didn't announce specific actions against Nicaragua, but took a shot at Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, who have increasingly centralized government control. 
 
 Nicaragua will remain a target for U.S. sanctions until it holds free and fair elections, said Bolton. 
 
 "Until then, the Nicaraguan regime, like Venezuela and Cuba, will feel the full weight of America’s robust sanctions," he added. 
 
 But the brunt of Thursday's actions was aimed at Cuba, blamed by the administration's top Western Hemisphere experts for the region's democratic regressions. 
 
 Building on a presidential memorandum released last year that slapped sanctions on entities connected to Cuban military intelligence, Bolton said "over two dozen additional entities owned or controlled by the Cuban military and intelligence services to the restricted list of entities with which financial transactions by U.S. persons are prohibited." 
 
 The moves represent a sharp departure from the Obama administration's policy of rapprochement with Cuba. President Obama restored diplomatic relations with the island in 2015; they'd been severed since 1961. 
 
 The Trump administration stopped short of closing the U.S. Embassy in Havana, but Bolton presented a harsh, if veiled, criticism of the Obama approach. 
 
 "Members of this administration will never take a picture in front of Che Guevara, plastered over the Cuban ministry that runs the National Revolutionary Police," said Bolton. 
 
 "As you know, this organization is responsible for oppressing dissidents and suppressing every kind of freedom known to man. 
 
 "We will not glamorize Marxist guerillas to promote a delusion of our own glory. 
 
 "Our concern is with sanctions, not selfies," he added, in reference to Obama's 2016 visit to Cuba. 
 
 But the U.S. Embassy in Havana will remained staffed by a skeleton crew, following the so-called sonic attacks that caused mysterious illnesses and permanent brain damage to some U.S. and Canadian diplomats on the island. 
 
 The Cuban government has denied any involvement in the attacks. 
 
 "This president will not allow our diplomats to be targeted with impunity. And we will not excuse those who harm our highest representatives abroad by falsely invoking videos, or concocting some other absurd pretext for their suffering," Bolton said. 
 
 The aggressive stance against the "Troika of Tyranny" follows the administration's reorganization of Western Hemisphere policy under Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo Michael (Mike) Richard PompeoThe Hill's 12:30 Report — Takeaways from Trump address | White House says emergency declaration 'on the table' | Dem response becomes a meme Forget the border wall, a coup in Guatemala is the real emergency Pompeo in Iraq for unannounced visit MORE. 
 
 In October, the Senate approved the nomination of Kimberly Breier as assistant secretary of State for Western Hemisphere affairs, filling a top regional diplomatic position that had remained vacant since 2016, when Roberta Jacobson was appointed ambassador to Mexico by Obama. 
 
 Trump also named in September Mauricio Claver-Carone, a Cuba policy expert, to lead Western Hemisphere affairs at the National Security Council. 
 
 In an interview in October with The Hill, Otto Juan Reich, who held the assistant secretary position under President George W. Bush, said, "The Trump policy toward Latin America is about three months old.” 
 
 "We’re sort of where we should’ve been in February of 2017, so this is the beginning of the Trump admin policy toward Latin America," Reich added. 
 
 Bolton closed his speech to loud applause, after comparing the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua to The Three Stooges. 
 
 "These tyrants fancy themselves strongmen and revolutionaries, icons and luminaries. In reality, they are clownish, pitiful figures more akin to Larry, Curly, and Moe. The three stooges of socialism are true believers, but they worship a false god," said Bolton. 
 
 "The United States looks forward to watching each corner of the triangle fall: in Havana, in Caracas, in Managua," he added. ||||| Bolton hailed Brazilian president-elect a ‘positive sign’ as he announced new sanctions against Venezuela and Cuba 
 
 John Bolton has welcomed Brazil’s far-right president-elect Jair Bolsonaro as a “positive sign” for Latin America as he hailed a new ally against what Bolton called a “troika of tyranny”: Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. 
 
 In a speech in Miami on Thursday, the US national security adviser announced new sanctions against Venezuela and Cuba, including a ban on US citizens taking part in trade in Venezuelan gold. Bolton also added over two dozen entities owned or controlled by the Cuban military and intelligence services to a sanctions blacklist. 
 
 Trump joy over Bolsonaro suggests new rightwing axis in Americas and beyond Read more 
 
 Bolton was speaking a few days before midterm elections in which the diaspora from Cuba and other Latin American states represent an important part of the Florida electorate. 
 
 As the Trump administration has done in the Middle East, Bolton drew a clear line between friends and foes, and used bellicose language likely to stoke growing fears in Latin America that Washington could recruit rightwing governments in Brazil and Colombia to take military action against Venezuela. 
 
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 “The recent elections of like-minded leaders in key countries, including Ivan Duque in Colombia, and last weekend Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, are positive signs for the future of the region, and demonstrate a growing regional commitment to free-market principles, and open, transparent, and accountable governance,” Bolton said in his speech at Miami-Dade College. 
 
 He did not address widespread concerns about Bolsonaro’s stated admiration for Brazil’s 21-year military dictatorship and its use of torture, and portrayed repression in Latin America as an exclusively communist phenomenon. 
 
 “[T]oday, in this hemisphere, we are also confronted once again with the destructive forces of oppression, socialism and totalitarianism” Bolton said. 
 
 “Under this administration, we will no longer appease dictators and despots near our shores in this hemisphere. We will not reward firing squads, torturers, and murderers … The troika of tyranny in this hemisphere – Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua – has finally met its match.” 
 
 Quick guide Why is Venezuela in crisis? Show Hide Under the late Hugo Chávez, who ushered in Venezuela’s socialist revolution in 1999, a new constitution and numerous elections placed nearly all government institutions under the control of the ruling Socialist party. This concentration of power was aided by a feuding opposition which carried out ineffectual campaigns and electoral boycotts. After Chávez died of cancer in 2013, he was succeeded by Nicolás Maduro who is even less tolerant of dissent. Growing political authoritarianism has coincided with greater state dominance over the economy. But expropriations, price controls and mismanagement have led to a 40% contraction of the economy in the past five years. Oil accounts for 96% of Venezuela’s export income but many foreign companies have been driven out and production has dropped to a 30-year low. The resulting fiscal crisis has prompted the government to print more money, which has led to hyperinflation and a collapse of the currency. It also means that the government can’t import enough food and medicine to meet demand. Maduro has rejected economic reforms out of loyalty to socialism and because many government officials are allegedly getting rich off the economic distortions – through exchange rate scams and by selling scarce food on the black market. 
 
 
 
 Fleeing Venezuelans face suspicion and hostility as migration crisis worsens Read more 
 
 The collapse of the Venezuelan economy – largely as a result of the incompetence, corruption and repression of the Maduro regime – has triggered an exodus of more than 2 million people into neighbouring countries, precipitating a regional crisis. 
 
 In Nicaragua, hundreds of people have been killed in a brutal crackdown on protests against the country’s leader, Daniel Ortega. In Cuba, although Raúl Castro has stepped down as president and reforms have been announced, the island remains in the firm grip of the communist party. 
 
 As well as referring to the three countries as the “troika of tyranny”, Bolton called them a “triangle of terror stretching from Havana to Caracas to Managua”, rhetorical devices echoing George W Bush’s “axis of evil”. 
 
 He accused the three countries of being “the cause of immense human suffering, the impetus of enormous regional instability, and the genesis of a sordid cradle of communism in the western hemisphere”. 
 
 However, on the same day, the Trump administration’s relative isolation was highlighted at the UN general assembly, which overwhelmingly adopted its 27th annual resolution calling for an end to the US economic embargo on Cuba. The US mission tried unsuccessfully to amend the text of the resolution to put pressure on Cuba to improve its human rights record. 
 
 The speech was delivered among rising tensions in Latin America. Earlier this week, Colombia’s foreign minister, Carlos Holmes Trujillo, denied reports in the Brazilian press that Colombia was conspiring with Bolsonaro to use force to topple Venezuela’s leader, Nicolás Maduro. In his speech, Bolton only referred to the use of sanctions against the three governments. 
 
 Bolsonaro's pledge to return Brazil to past alarms survivors of dictatorship Read more 
 
 Bolton’s cold war rhetoric also came at the height of a hard-fought congressional election campaign that could ultimately determine the fate of Trump’s presidency. A day before Bolton’s trip to Miami, it was reported that the administration was considering allowing Cuban Americans to use US courts to sue foreign companies which control property in Cuba seized from exiles by the government in Havana. 
 
 “This was more a ‘transparent triumvirate of electorates’ from Nicaragua, Venezuela and Cuba,” said Christopher Sabatini, a Columbia University professor and expert on the region. “It is no coincidence that this speech is being made where there are tight races for governor and for Congress. It is just another example of how our policy in the hemisphere is driven by local politics, and it’s sad.”
– More than 16 years after arguing that George W. Bush should add Cuba, Syria, and Libya to Iran, Iraq, and North Korea in the "Axis of Evil," John Bolton has coined a new term. In a policy speech at a conference in Miami, the national security adviser dubbed Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela the "Troika of Tyranny" in the western hemisphere, the Hill reports. "In Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, we see the perils of poisonous ideologies left unchecked, and the dangers of domination and suppression," Bolton said. He referred to the leaders of the three countries as the "Three Stooges of socialism," who are "true believers, but they worship a false god." Bolton jabbed at the previous administration's policies, saying the Trump administration is concerned with "sanctions, not selfies." "Under this administration, we will no longer appease dictators and despots near our shores in this hemisphere," said Bolton. "We will not reward firing squads, torturers, and murderers." He praised the election of right-wing leaders in Latin America, including Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil. Bolton announced new sanctions on Venezuela and Cuba, including a ban on American citizens trading in Venezuelan gold, and said Nicaragua would "feel the full weight of America's robust sanctions" until it allows free and fair elections to take place, the Guardian reports. (A source says President Trump discussed an invasion of Venezuela last year.)