Washington DC - President Donald Trump summoned his top national security officials to the Oval Office on Monday to discuss Venezuela, as his counterpart Nicolás Maduro rejected a "slave's peace" amid mounting fears of the US launching a war.

The meeting comes as Trump ramps up pressure with a major naval build-up in the Caribbean, deadly strikes on boats in international waters, and ominous warnings to avoid Venezuelan airspace.

"I will confirm that the president will be meeting with his national security team on this subject and on many matters," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told a briefing when asked by AFP about reports of the meeting.

Leavitt would not say whether Trump would reach a final decision after months of tensions with Caracas, saying she was "definitely not going to detail the specifics of the meeting."

But she declined to rule out the possibility of US troops on the ground on Venezuela.

"There's options at the president's disposal that are on the table, and I'll let him speak on those," Leavitt said.

Maduro, who accuses Washington of seeking to topple him, told thousands of supporters at a rally in Caracas that Venezuela does not want a "slave's peace."

"We want peace, but peace with sovereignty, equality, freedom!" he said. "We do not want a slave's peace, nor the peace of colonies."

The US has moved the world's largest aircraft carrier and other warships into the region, and designated an alleged drug cartel – which it claims without evidence is being run by Maduro – as a terrorist group, escalating an already aggressive approach.

Trump confirmed Sunday he had recently spoken with Maduro for the first time since returning to office in January, but would not give details.

"I wouldn't say it went well or badly. It was a phone call," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One.

The New York Times reported that Trump and Maduro had discussed a possible meeting, while The Wall Street Journal said that the conversation also included conditions of amnesty if Maduro were to step down.

Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin said Sunday on CNN's State of the Union talk show that the United States has offered Maduro the chance to leave his country for Russia or elsewhere.

The US accuses Maduro, the political heir to Venezuela's late leftist leader Hugo Chavez, of heading the so-called Cartel of the Suns and has issued a $50 million reward for his capture.

Meanwhile, Trump's administration has embarked on a killing spree in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean, leaving at least 83 people dead in what legal experts consider to be blatantly illegal strikes.

The mounting outrage reached new levels after it emerged the US military had conducted a "double-tap" strike that killed two survivors clinging to a burning boat in the Caribbean in early September, with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly issuing an order to "kill everybody."