Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino on Wednesday called an incident this week in which a U.S. Navy ship navigated near the country's coast an "act of provocation."

"A United States Navy destroyer approached within 30 miles of the coast, in a clear act of provocation. It cannot be termed otherwise ... it is a clear defiant act," Padrino said during a military ceremony to commemorate a decisive battle in Venezuela's war of independence.

"It is an empty victory," Padrino said in the speech broadcast on state television. "It is a childish act."

The operation took place in an area that Caracas says it controls.

But the U.S. military's Southern Command on Tuesday said the missile destroyer Nitze cruising off Venezuela's coast was a "freedom of navigation" operation.

The U.S. Navy ship "lawfully conducted" the operation in international waters outside Venezuela's 12 nautical-mile territorial jurisdiction and was intended to preserve maritime navigation and access right around the world, the U.S. military's Southern Command said in a post on its website.

Under the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea, territorial waters extend at most 12 nautical miles from a country's shores. The U.S. has signed the convention but has not ratified it, while Venezuela has neither signed nor acceded the convention.

The U.S. Southern Command said that a similar "freedom-of-navigation operation" took place on January 21 off Venezuela's Caribbean coast.

The tensions between the two countries have escalated in recent weeks over the arrival of five Iranian tankers to help alleviate shortages in the South American country.

(With input from agencies)