( CNN ) Venezuela has given the U.S. Embassy in Caracas 15 days to downsize its staff from 100 personnel to 17 . `` With respect to bringing the number of staff at the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela to 17 , a period of 15 days will be given to decide which staff will stay in our country , '' said Venezuela 's Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez on Monday . Venezuela 's official news agency AVN ( Agencia Venezolana de Noticias ) said the U.S. Embassy has been asked to reduce its personnel to a staff of 17 to match the number of Venezuelan personnel working in their embassy in the United States . Last month , the U.S. government approved a law under which Venezuelan officials allegedly involved in human rights violations are to have their visas revoked and their U.S. assets frozen . Following that decision , Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro announced that that Americans will need visas to visit Venezuela . Moreover , a group of prominent U.S. officials , current and retired , will be banned from entering Venezuela because of what Maduro said was their involvement in `` bombing Iraq , Syria and Vietnam '' and other `` terrorist '' actions . The officials include George W. Bush , former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney , former CIA Director George Tenet and several current members of Congress , including Ileana Ros-Lehtinen , Bob Menendez and Mario Diaz-Balart . On Saturday , Maduro also said an unspecified number of Americans were arrested `` a few days ago '' for engaging in espionage and recruitment activities . The President said they included an American pilot of Latin American origin , arrested in the southwest border state of Táchira . He said the pilot was found in possession of `` all kinds of documents '' and was being interrogated by the authorities , though he did not identify him . The Venezuelan government has made many similar claims in recent years , without ever substantiating them . `` There have been a lot of anti-American rhetoric again coming out of the Venezuelan Government with a lot of baseless allegations , '' said U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf on Monday .
President bush has said Americans will need visas to visit foreigners . He also said several Americans were arrested for espionage . The State department called the arrests ` ` baseless ''