Caracas (EFE).- The promise of the government led by interim president Delcy Rodríguez to grant 300 prison releases this week in Venezuela clashed on Wednesday with the repeated demand for full freedom for all political prisoners in the country, a demand that relatives and human rights defenders have been making for years.
A day after the Executive’s announcement, a silent march attended by activists and relatives of political prisoners advanced to the Ministry of Penitentiary Service to denounce the deaths under state custody that have occurred since 2014, which several NGOs estimate at 27.
«It must be everyone» and «Delcy, it’s not 300, the order is that it must be everyone,» were some of the slogans shouted by the demonstrators at the end of the protest.
On Tuesday, the president of the Parliament, Jorge Rodríguez, promised the release of a group of 300 people this week, as part of a new round of releases.
The measures will be granted in parallel to those awarded through the amnesty law approved in February, which has benefited more than 8,000 people, most of whom were on parole.
The announcement also follows the releases of January, which the Government tallied at more than 800 within the framework of a «new political moment» in the country, following the capture of former president Nicolás Maduro by the United States.
Rodríguez affirmed that the new releases began on Monday, with the excarceration of a 16-year-old adolescent and Merys Torres de Sequea, 71, mother of Captain Antonio Sequea, who was sentenced to 24 years in prison for being part of a failed maritime attack against the Maduro Government in May 2020.
However, as of Wednesday morning, the NGO Foro Penal, a leader in the legal defense of political prisoners, had counted about 25 political prisoners released since Monday.
According to the NGO’s vice president director, Gonzalo Himiob, on X, the Foro Penal team remains on guard throughout the country to verify the releases.
Although they had not updated the total again as of Wednesday afternoon, the Committee for the Freedom of Political Prisoners (Clipp) reported on the release of eight people who were detained at the National Bolivarian Police headquarters in La Yaguara, in Caracas.
Among those released in this new group are Venezuela’s longest-serving prisoners, three officials of the defunct Caracas Metropolitan Police who were convicted for events related to the failed coup d’état against Hugo Chávez (1999-2013) in 2002.
‘Close the torture centers’
These releases come at a time when opposition parties are demanding an independent investigation with international support into the death under state custody of political prisoner Víctor Hugo Quero Navas, which the Government reported on May 7, after 16 months of reports of his disappearance by the detainee’s mother, Carmen Teresa Navas, who died on Sunday.
Because of Quero’s case, the relatives of political prisoners called for the silent protest in front of the Ministry of Penitentiary Service headquarters.
Most attendees put black adhesive tape over their mouths while displaying posters with photographs and names of political prisoners.
In the center of the march, they carried a cardboard coffin bearing the names of the political prisoners who have died under state custody.
Upon arriving at the ministry’s headquarters, attendees began chanting ‘not one more death,’ ‘close the torture centers,’ ‘indolent minister, urgent removal.’
«We are denouncing what continues to happen in Venezuela,» Andreína Baduel, a member of the Committee for the Freedom of Political Prisoners (CLIPP), told EFE.
She also denounced that with Quero, there have been 27 political prisoners who have died under state custody since 2014, and she warned that none «has received true justice.»
Aurora Silva, wife of the recently released Freddy Superlano, told EFE: «we must ensure that everyone is free and that they leave those unjust prisons.»
The new releases take place a week after the President of the United States, Donald Trump, affirmed that his Government will ensure the release of all those imprisoned for political reasons in Venezuela. EFE
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