The government of Nicolás Maduro freed in the early hours of Thursday morning (1) 87 people who were incarcerated for political reasons, the Committee of Mothers in Defense of Truth (Comité de Mães em Defesa da Verdade), one of the leading NGOs monitoring the situation of those imprisoned by the regime after protests against the official election results in the country, reported on social media.
According to the organization, these releases were preceded by another 71 releases that occurred at Christmas.
According to the Committee, the fact that these people have been freed is the result of the struggle of hundreds of mothers and family members who mobilized for more than a year to demand justice, and who found along the way the solidarity of people and grassroots organizations. “We have no doubt that demanding our rights, even in moments of great adversity, is the right path to achieve the full freedom of our youth,” the NGO wrote in a Facebook post.
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The achievement, however, is considered insufficient by the organization, which noted that it is a limited freedom because these people remain under trial and with precautionary measures, in addition to many other family members still being “arbitrarily deprived of liberty.”
According to the NGO, injustice continues to affect hundreds of families in Venezuela. “Therefore, from the Committee of Mothers in Defense of Truth, we insist that the country needs a general amnesty, which would grant full freedom to all people arbitrarily detained for political reasons. We will continue to fight until we achieve the full freedom of each of our youths. Please, do not leave us alone.”
The newspaper El Nacional noted on Thursday that the NGO Foro Penal counted, as of December 15, 902 political prisoners in Venezuela, 86 of them foreigners or Venezuelans with another nationality. Meanwhile, the NGO Justiça, Encontro e Perdão (JEP) counted this figure and more than 1,000.
Although they do not contest the numbers released by the Committee, these NGOs confirm lower figures for releases: between 29 and 47 people.
