Geneva (AFP) – Venezuela’s Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto on Monday demanded the immediate release of Nicolas Maduro, who was ousted as president in a January 3 raid by the United States. Maduro, who autocratically ruled Venezuela between March 2013 and his capture by US forces, is in custody in New York along with his wife, awaiting trial. Maduro, 63, has pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges and declared that he was a “prisoner of war”.
Addressing the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Gil demanded “the immediate release by the government of the United States of America of the constitutional president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro Moros, and his wife, the first lady Cilia Flores”. “January 3, 2026, marked a turning point of extreme gravity,” Gil told the top UN rights body. “An illegal military action against our country resulted in the deaths of more than 100 people, and the arbitrary detention” of Maduro and his wife, Gil said.
“Despite this action, carried out in a context of profound technological and military asymmetry between our country and the nuclear power of the United States … we have chosen to open a diplomatic channel to resolve our differences with that country,” he said. “Not through submission, but in the sovereign equality of states. Not through fear, but with the conviction that dialogue is the only civilised path between nations.”
– ‘Reconciliation’ aim –
Gil said Venezuela was insisting on the need for “international cooperation based on the legal equality of states”. Venezuela’s top diplomat stressed that his country was “working toward a process of acknowledging past wounds, forgiveness, and reconciliation”, referring to a new amnesty law passed. The country’s legislature unanimously adopted the landmark law last Thursday, and interim leader Delcy Rodriguez hailed its passage, describing it as a step toward “a more democratic, fairer, freer Venezuela”.
Opposition figures have criticised the new legislation, which appears to include carve-outs for some offences previously used by authorities to target Maduro’s political opponents. But the amnesty extends to 11,000 political prisoners who, over nearly three decades, were paroled or placed under house arrest. More than 200 Venezuelan political prisoners at the Rodeo I prison, about 40 kilometres (25 miles) east of the capital Caracas, were on hunger strike Sunday to demand their release under the new amnesty law.
On Sunday, a team from the International Committee of the Red Cross visited the jail. “This is the first time they have allowed us to approach that prison,” Filippo Gatti, the ICRC’s health coordinator for Venezuela, told family members. “It’s a first step, and I think we’re on the right track.” Some 600 political prisoners remain behind bars throughout the country, according to Foro Penal — an NGO dedicated to the defence of political prisoners — despite approximately 500 releases since January.
Meanwhile, the UN rights office is in talks with Caracas to re-establish an office in Venezuela. Its staff had been expelled in February 2024. “The government of Venezuela has taken steps to temporarily resume cooperation with the UN Human Rights Office,” a spokeswoman for the Geneva-based agency told AFP on Monday. “Negotiations are ongoing to conclude, as soon as possible, a longer-term agreement that will enable the UN Human Rights Office to fully carry out its mandate in Venezuela.”
© 2024 AFP
