Venezuela has warned that neighbouring Colombia’s partnership with NATO represents “a serious threat to peace and regional stability.”

President Juan Manuel Santos announced on Friday that Colombia would be working with the West’s military alliance as a “global partner” from this week, becoming the first Latin American country to do so.

In a statement, Venezuela’s Foreign Ministry said: “Venezuela denounces once more before the international community the intention of Colombian authorities to introduce, in Latin America and the Caribbean, a foreign military alliance with nuclear capacity, which in every way constitutes a serious threat for peace and regional stability.”

Caracas confirmed the historical position of the region in distancing itself from the politics and wars of Nato and from “any other army or military organisation that desires to apply forces to the suffering of the people, to impose and guarantee the hegemony of a particular political and economic model.”

Venezuela has come under intense pressure from foreign powers seeking regime change with a range of sanctions imposed by the US and European Union.