AKIPRESS.COM - Two nephews of the wife of President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela were arrested this week in Haiti and flown to the United States where they will face drug trafficking charges, according to a person with knowledge of the matter.

The arrests are sure to roil already tense relations between the United States and Venezuela and could tarnish the Venezuelan government’s image as it heads into crucial legislative elections scheduled for next month, NYTimes reports.

The two men, Efraín Antonio Campo Flores and Francisco Flores de Freitas, are nephews of Cilia Flores, the wife of Mr. Maduro, the person with knowledge of the matter said. Mr. Maduro, a leftist, calls Ms. Flores the country’s “first combatant” rather than its first lady. Ms. Flores is one of the most powerful people in the upper echelons of government and is frequently seen at her husband’s side.

The two men were arrested Tuesday in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, at the request of the American authorities and handed over to agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration, who put them on an agency plane and flew them to the United States, the person said. They are expected to appear in Federal District Court in Manhattan on Thursday.

The arrests were first reported Wednesday by Reuters and The Wall Street Journal.

The two men were charged in a sealed indictment accusing them of conspiring to ship 800 kilograms of cocaine to the United States, to be sold in New York, according to the person with knowledge of the matter.

In October, the two men approached a D.E.A. informant in Honduras and discussed moving the narcotics through that country, the person said. They later met with the informant in Venezuela and provided a kilogram of the cocaine as a sample of the drugs they intended to provide, the person said, adding that agents had made video and audiotapes of at least one of the encounters.

The investigation was conducted by the federal Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force in New York, which is made up of agents from the D.E.A., the Department of Homeland Security, the New York Police Department, the New York State Police, the United States Marshals Service and the Internal Revenue Service.