New charges of state-led repression

Nicolás Maduro arrived at the New York court with his ankles in shackles. The rewritten indictment accuses him and Cilia Flores of running a state-sponsored campaign of repression whose victims - scores of people, among them three Americans - were tortured. Prosecutors say Maduro stood over a violent torture system whose victims were beaten, asphyxiated and given electric shocks.

• According to the indictment, Maduro personally suggested torture methods and was kept informed about how victims were being treated.
• He is alleged to have threatened to kill one prisoner's child as psychological torture.
• Flores, 70, who served as attorney general, is said to have helped build the repressive system and ordered torture of particular individuals.

The torture allegations in the revised indictment reach back to 2013, the year Maduro took over from Hugo Chávez after the latter's death from cancer.

The hearing and the pleas

When Judge Alvin K Hellerstein asked for a plea, Maduro answered twice - not with a plea but with criticism of the document, telling the court through an interpreter it held "false accusations and false testimony". Hellerstein then entered a not-guilty plea for Maduro and his wife.

Flores, also speaking through an interpreter, answered the same question directly.

How the case reached New York

US forces took Maduro and Flores from their Caracas home in a January night-time raid. In the US drug trafficking case alleging a conspiracy to flood the US with cocaine, the pair pleaded not guilty earlier this year; their lawyers want the case thrown out on immunity grounds, citing their roles as leader and first lady.

When the new charges were announced last week, Maduro's attorney Barry Pollack said Maduro, 63, denied them and "looks forward to his day in court". Maduro led Venezuela from 2013 until his January capture, and for years the international criminal court has investigated him over alleged crimes against humanity connected to his crackdown on opponents - allegations he has consistently rejected.

Next step: a moved trial date

Prosecutors told the hearing that lawyers for both sides want the trial shifted from 1 June to 14 June. Such US prosecutions of foreign officials are exceedingly rare, even though international law allows torture to be tried outside the country where it happened and whatever the victims' nationality. Earlier US cases have targeted the son of former Liberian president Charles Taylor, Russians responsible for war crimes in Ukraine, and a onetime prison warden in Bashar Assad's Syria.