Latest news with #Maduro
Time of India
17 hours ago
- Politics
- Time of India
Beaten, kicked, humiliated: Deported Venezuelans allege abuse in El Salvador prison; return home after US swap
Migrants deported by US arrive in Venezuela (AP photo) Venezuelan migrants who had been detained for months in El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison returned to their homes this week, describing their time behind bars as abusive. Several men and their family members reported the stories of being beaten, kicked, and humiliated while locked up. Some showed visible bruises, news agency Associated Press reported. Their release came after a prisoner exchange deal involving the US, El Salvador, and Venezuela. Ten American citizens, including a former Navy SEAL, were released by Venezuela. In return, over 200 Venezuelan men deported by US under an old wartime law were handed back to the Maduro government after spending four months in El Salvador. These migrants were sent to El Salvador earlier this year after the Trump administration used the Alien Enemies Act to justify their removal, accusing them of being linked to Venezuela's Tren de Aragua gang. No formal charges were made public. Migrants and their families say that tattoos and appearances were wrongly used as evidence of gang affiliation. Venezuela's state TV aired video testimonies of released migrants alleging torture, sexual abuse, and severe beatings. Interior minister Diosdado Cabello said only a handful of the deported men faced pending legal cases. The rest, he said, would be allowed to return home after medical checks and background reviews. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Swelling and internal bleeding in the brain, help this baby Donate For Health Donate Now Undo Venezuelan attorney general Tarek William Saab has also announced an investigation into the allegations against Salvadoran officials. In CECOT, prisoners cannot receive visitors, and hearings happen only via Zoom. Cell signal is blocked within a mile-and-a-half radius surrounding the prison to keep any information from getting out, to contain the power of gangs, which authorities said used to control 85% of the country's territory.
First Post
a day ago
- Politics
- First Post
Venezuela's Maduro Targets El Salvador's Bukele Over Migrant Abuse Firstpost America
Venezuela's Maduro Targets El Salvador's Bukele Over Migrant Abuse| Firstpost America | N18G Venezuela Venezuela's Maduro Targets El Salvador's Bukele Over Migrant Abuse| Firstpost America | N18G Venezuela has launched a criminal investigation into El Salvador's President Nayib Bukele and two senior officials, accusing them of human rights violations against Venezuelan migrants. Over 250 Venezuelans were deported from the US and detained in El Salvador's high-security CECOT prison, where they allegedly faced torture and mistreatment. The prisoners were released last week as part of a three-country deal involving the US. Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro has condemned El Salvador's prison conditions, while President Bukele denies wrongdoing. Rights groups have long criticised CECOT, and diplomatic tensions between the two nations are now intensifying. Watch to know more. See More
NZ Herald
2 days ago
- Business
- NZ Herald
Independent experts sharing data about Venezuela's financial crisis are being detained
The Central Bank of Venezuela for years has not released reliable data on key indicators like inflation, leaving economists to fill the gaps with independent estimates. 'It's kind of like the Tinkerbell theory of economics,' he added, referring to Maduro's effort to squelch any bad economic news. 'If you believe in her, then her light continues to shine.' The Government's campaign has rattled economists and others behind financial information websites. Even those who live abroad are afraid to speak publicly, fearing reprisals against their families or employees. Among the economists who have been detained is a former finance minister and economics professor, Rodrigo Cabezas, 69, who once served in the governing party but later distanced himself and criticised Maduro's economic policies. Cabezas' daughter Rodna Cabezas said in an interview that on June 3, officials from the state energy company arrived at their home in Maracaibo, in northwestern Venezuela, claiming there was a problem with the electricity. They asked her father to accompany them to resolve it. But then she said her father called her, saying that it had been a trap and that intelligence agents were detaining him. His family has not heard from him since, nor received any information from the Government. 'We don't know where they took him,' Cabezas said. Vendors at the Mercado de Coche, a huge wholesale produce market, in Caracas. Photo / the New York Times The family has hired a lawyer who has also been unable to contact him. Her father needs daily medication for high blood pressure, she said. 'It's very hard,' she said. 'I don't have tears anymore from crying so much. It's like a permanent knife in my heart.' Venezuela's economy imploded a decade ago, driven by government mismanagement and exacerbated by US sanctions. As hyperinflation surged to 300,000% and the local currency, the bolivar, rapidly lost value, Venezuelans began keeping their savings in US dollars. The Central Bank of Venezuela sets an official exchange rate for the bolivar, but most people rely on an unofficial rate called the parallel dollar, published by websites like Monitor Dólar, that reflects what dollars actually sell for on the street. The official rate has often made the bolivar seem slightly stronger than it really is, creating a more favourable picture of the economy. But inflation is surging, analysts say, causing the bolivar to lose value and leaving Venezuelans who are paid in the local currency struggling to exchange it for dollars. 'The dollar-bolivar exchange rate is one of the key variables that the Government is trying to keep a handle on,' Gunson said. He said the Government believes it can stop the bolivar from losing value by silencing people like economists who report on the unofficial exchange rate. And precise inflation figures are no longer available because the Government does not publish such data and has gone after independent economists who do. Other countries in the region like Argentina have been accused of manipulating economic data in times of crisis. Experts say the crackdown in Venezuela on economists and independent financial groups reflects a broader strategy by the Maduro Government to suppress data and silence dissent in order to manage public perception. The Venezuelan Government has not released official statistics on epidemiology since 2016 and has kept data on rising child deaths from hunger a closely guarded secret. Under President Joe Biden, the US relaxed oil sanctions that helped decimate the country's finances in the hopes of prodding the Government into holding free and fair elections. As inflation eased, everyday products became easily available and more affordable, and poverty started decreasing. But last year, Maduro declared victory in an election widely seen by many governments, including the US, as fraudulent. President Donald Trump has since imposed renewed sanctions and revoked a key licence for Chevron to operate in Venezuela, whose economy is heavily dependent on oil. The country's economic tailspin has left many Venezuelans weary and with little faith that the Government can find a solution, analysts said. The financial district in Caracas. Photo / the New York Times According to the human rights group Provea, at least five economists were arrested from May 29 to June 5. Some were released, but two, including Rodrigo Cabezas, remain missing, with no information provided on their whereabouts or the charges they face. At least 20 people linked to Monitor Dólar were detained for reporting on the parallel dollar, according to Maduro's top deputy and Interior Minister, Diosdado Cabello. Cabello, on his weekly television programme, denounced economists 'who are saying the bolivar is worthless — these people are playing with fire'. Authorities, he added, were pursuing 'disguised consultants' who were fuelling financial instability. But the Venezuelan Finance Observatory, an independent group that publishes data on the country's economy, said that 'it is not a crime to compile and disclose price figures'. Financial websites like Monitar Dólar and the cryptocurrency platform El Dorado — where people buy cryptocurrency using bolivars to exchange for dollars — have shut down in response to government pressure. 'I take responsibility for any negative impact generated by the app,' a founder of El Dorado, Guillermo Goncalvez, said in a video. The plight of Cabezas and the other missing economist is a familiar story to human rights activists. In recent years, it has become common for Venezuelan authorities to detain people and hold them indefinitely at undisclosed locations with no contact allowed with family members or lawyers. 'Nowadays, nothing surprises us,' Gunson said. 'There now appear to be no rules. The law, the constitution, nothing counts anymore.' This article originally appeared in The New York Times. Written by: Genevieve Glatsky Photographs by: The New York Times ©2025 THE NEW YORK TIMES
New Indian Express
5 days ago
- Politics
- New Indian Express
Venezuela releases jailed Americans in deal that frees migrants deported to El Salvador by US
The Venezuelans had been held in a mega-prison known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, or CECOT, which was built to hold alleged gang members in Bukele's war on the country's gangs. Human rights groups have documented hundreds of deaths as well as cases of torture inside its walls. Lawyers have little access to those in the prison, which is heavily guarded, and information has been locked tight, other than heavily produced state propaganda videos showing tattooed men packed behind bars. Photos and videos released by El Salvador's government on Friday showed shackled Venezuelans sitting in a fleet of buses and boarding planes surrounded by officers in riot gear. One man looked up and pointed toward the sky as he climbed aboard a plane, while another made an obscene gesture toward police. After arriving in Venezuela, some of the migrants crossed themselves, cried and hugged one another. They wore face masks and street clothes. Maduro alleged that some of them were subjected to various forms of abuse at the Salvadoran prison, and one of them even lost a kidney 'due to the beatings he received.' Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello told reporters the men would undergo medical tests and background checks before they can go home. One of the men is reportedly Andry Hernández Romero, a makeup artist who fled Venezuela last year and was taken into Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody at a border crossing in San Diego before eventually being flown to El Salvador. Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., posted on social media Friday night: 'We have been in touch with Andry Hernández Romero's legal team and they have confirmed he is out of CECOT and back in Venezuela. We are grateful he is alive and are engaged with both the State Department and his team.' In April, Bukele proposed exchanging the Venezuelans for the same number of what he called 'political prisoners' held by Maduro. The suggestion provoked a harsh response from Venezuelan authorities, who called his comments 'cynical' and referred to Bukele as a 'neofascist." Families say the Americans released are innocent The State Department office responsible for negotiating the release of American detainees posted a photo Friday evening of the newly released prisoners smiling for the camera inside an airplane bringing them home, some clutching an unfurled American flag. A plane carrying the freed Americans arrived late Friday evening at Joint Base San Antonio, with some waving flags and rushing to embrace welcomers after they landed. Among those released was 37-year-old Lucas Hunter, whose family says he was kidnapped in January by Venezuelan border guards from inside Colombia, where he was vacationing. 'We cannot wait to see him in person and help him recover from the ordeal,' his younger sister Sophie Hunter said. Venezuelan authorities detained nearly a dozen U.S. citizens in the second half of 2024 and linked them to alleged plots to destabilize the country.
Times
5 days ago
- Politics
- Times
US swaps El Salvador inmates for Americans held in Venezuela
A prisoner swap has led to the release of more than 230 Venezuelans that were deported in March by the Trump administration to a notorious jail in El Salvador. The group was flown on Friday to Venezuela in exchange for ten US citizens and permanent residents held by the regime of President Maduro. About 80 Venezuelan political prisoners are also understood to have been released. The deal was the result of months of secret negotiations between the governments of the United States, Venezuela and El Salvador. 'Today, we have handed over all the Venezuelan nationals detained in our country,' President Bukele of El Salvador posted on X. He alleged that all those released were linked to a Venezuela gang, the Tren de Aragua, a claim which is disputed. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, confirmed the US side of the arrangement, posting on X: 'Thanks to @POTUS's leadership, ten Americans who were detained in Venezuela are on their way to freedom.' The Venezuelans were deported on March 15 to El Salvador's notorious Cecot 'terrorism confinement centre' by the Trump administration. It used an 18th century legislation, the Alien Enemies Act, which was originally designed to rid the country of French spies, to fast-track the process. • El Salvador signs deal to house deported US prisoners in mega-jail A last-minute attempt to block the deportation flights in March by a US judge was ignored by President Trump. The president also brushed aside investigations by American news networks that revealed that at least 75 per cent of the 238 detainees had no criminal records in either the US or Venezuela. Among those deported by the US were also several Salvadorans, including Kilmar Abrego García, a man the US government later admitted it had mistakenly included in the group. Human rights agencies have condemned conditions at Cecot, Bukele's flagship prison and a symbol of his zero-tolerance policy towards gang members. Up to 100 prisoners are held in each cell in a jail that is designed to hold 40,000. Inmates are given no right to appeal and all visits are prohibited. Bukele's security strategy is, however, immensely popular in El Salvador, where the murder rate has plummeted. The central American nation is now ranked by the US state department as safer for visitors than the UK or France. • Trump takes aim at 'weak and ineffective' judges over migrants The US government is understood to have paid El Salvador between $6 million and $15 million to hold its prisoners, leading to accusations that Bukele was operating a 'gulag' for foreigners. In Venezuela, families of the Venezuelans imprisoned in El Salvador had been lobbying for months for their release. Many had organised regular marches in Caracas. The Maduro regime, widely accused of its own human rights abuses, had seized on the issue, using it to argue to its own people that the Trump and Bukele governments were the real criminals. It initially angrily rejected the offer, first made in April by Bukele, and said it would not engage in any form of prisoner swap. 'Just free them unconditionally,' said Maduro on state television shortly after the proposal was presented. • Inside El Salvador, the brutal prison state run by a Bitcoin bro Announcing the prisoner swap on Friday, the Venezuelan government said it was 'satisfied' that a deal had been made, describing the Cecot prison as a 'concentration camp'. It also claimed it had paid a 'high price' by releasing the imprisoned Americans, alleging — without giving any details — that the individuals had threatened Venezuelan national security. For his part, Bukele had no kind words for the Maduro regime. 'This operation is the result of months of negotiations with a tyrannical regime that had long refused to release one of its most valuable bargaining chips: its hostages,' he said. 'However, thanks to the tireless efforts of many officials from both the United States and El Salvador, and above all, thanks to Almighty God, it was achieved.'
