Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, says that the United States military action in Venezuela that removed Nicolas Maduro as president was morally justified.
She made the remarks while speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Badenoch described the US intervention as “extraordinary” but said she understood why it was carried out, describing Venezuela as a “gangster state”.
“Where the legal certainty is not yet clear, morally, I do think it was the right thing to do,” she said.
Badenoch said her position was shaped by her personal experience of living under military rule during her early years in Nigeria.
“I grew up under a military dictatorship, so I know what it’s like to have someone like Maduro in charge,” she added.
Maduro has governed Venezuela since 2013 under what has been widely described as an authoritarian system.
He was sworn in last January for a third six-year term following elections that were disputed by opposition groups.
Maduro and his wife are currently in New York, facing charges related to weapons and drug offences.
They are accused of enriching themselves through a violent criminal network involved in smuggling cocaine into the United States.
Both have pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Badenoch spent much of her childhood in Nigeria after being born in the United Kingdom in 1980, where she lived until the age of 16 before returning to Britain in 1996.