Donald Trump has said he is willing to meet Nicolás Maduro if it would help ease suffering in Venezuela.

Trump’s remarks as he arrived for meetings at the United Nations came just hours before Maduro arrived at the last minute in New York to deliver his speech to the general assembly. He had earlier threatened to skip the summit.

“I’m willing to meet with anybody anytime I can [to] save lives, help people,” Trump said as he was asked whether the US would ever intervene militarily to remove Maduro.

Later on Wednesday, Maduro tweeted that he had arrived in New York to address the general assembly. “I bring the voice of my people, I come charged with patriotic passion to defend the truth,” he said.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders later said that no meeting with Maduro was planned.

Trump’s comments came just a day after Trump suggested Maduro could easily be toppled in a military coup, echoing comments first floated last year that some sort of “military solution” may be needed to restore Venezuela’s democracy.

Earlier on Tuesday, the US imposed financial sanctions on four members of Maduro’s inner circle, including his wife and the nation’s vice-president, on allegations of corruption.

Maduro has been seeking a meeting with Trump for almost two years and has watched with frustration as the US leader has talked with American adversaries such as North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and Russian president Vladimir Putin while shunning Venezuelan entreaties.

On Wednesday Maduro said he is willing to meet with Trump and to speak about anything the US government wants to discuss.

Citgo, a subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned oil company, was a major corporate donor to Trump’s inaugural committee. Maduro also this year freed a former Utah missionary jailed for more than two years on weapons charges in a bid to draw close to the White House.

Profile Who is Nicolás Maduro? Show Political career Nicolás Maduro has ruled Venezuela without two of the greatest assets possessed by his mentor and predecessor, Hugo Chávez. He has not been lucky. And he has no charisma. Chávez enjoyed an oil bounty and sublime political talents that secured his power at home and reputation abroad. Maduro, in contrast, inherited a wobbling economy addicted to high oil prices and a system of authoritarian populism dependent on showmanship and patronage. Oil prices tumbled and Maduro proved to be a fumbling showman, exposing the financial ineptitude and ideological hollowness of the “Bolivarian revolution”. This could have doomed his presidency, which began in 2013 after Chávez died, but the former bus driver, a hulking bear of a man who rose up trade union ranks, turned out to be tenacious and ruthless. Born into a working class family in Caracas in 1962, he left school without graduating and drove buses for the Caracas metro. He became a union organiser and early supporter of Chávez, who, after leading a failed coup, led a leftwing coalition to an electoral landslide in 1998. Maduro was the speaker of the assembly before serving as Chávez’s foreign minister from 2006 to 2013, a visible if largely silent presence as the comandante held court on the world stage. Chávez anointed Maduro as his heir before succumbing to cancer. The story of his rule – and Venezuela’s agony – is a determination to keep power amid economic collapse, humanitarian disaster and international condemnation. Since January 2019 his presidency has been disputed, with Juan Guaidó being sworn in as interim president, and recognised as Venezuela’s ruler by some international powers. Crisis after crisis has buffeted his government – hyperinflation, food and medicine shortages, power blackouts, mass protests, drone attacks, defections, US-led sanctions – and Maduro has remained standing, resolute, implacable. It is a remarkable position for a man who, in a 2014 Guardian interview, described himself as a bit of a hippy and a fan of Led Zeppelin and John Lennon. “I never aspired to be president,” he said. “I always honour something that commander Chávez told us: that while we were in these posts we must be clothed in humility and understand that we are here to protect the man and woman of the streets.” Rory Carroll

But his desire for some sort of reconciliation with the US has increased as international pressure has been building on his socialist government at a time of hyperinflation and widespread food and medicine shortages.

On Wednesday, presidents from several conservative Latin American governments are expected to meet in New York to sign a complaint with the International Criminal Court asking it to investigate Maduro on charges of crimes against humanity.

Maduro has not attended the UN general assembly since 2015 and said last week he may have to suspend his participation this year out of concerns his opponents would try to kill him if he travels abroad.

Maduro is probably on the plane from Caracas to NY after hearing this. Dream come true. https://t.co/aAyyDqafmy — Eva Golinger (@evagolinger) September 26, 2018

Trump said on Wednesday that all US options are on the table to help end the political, economic and humanitarian chaos in Venezuela – even the “strong ones”.

“I just want to see Venezuela straightened out. I want the people to be safe. We’re going to take care of Venezuela,” he said, calling Venezuela’s situation a “disgrace”.

“If he [Maduro] is here and he wants to meet – it was not on my mind, it was not on my plate, but if I can help people, that’s what I’m here for,” he added.