The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, confirmed Tuesday that the office he heads “does not have any type of staff in Venezuela.” The official, who was declared a person unwelcome by the Venezuelan Parliament last July, assured that “all possible efforts” had been made to continue operating in the country, “by requesting visas and dialoguing with the authorities, but without success”.
After this episode, it becomes evident the break that the Venezuelan government is making with the organizations that, in recent years, have denounced the abuses of the Nicolas Maduro regime, and with the international protocols on human rights to which Venezuela was a signatory. The latest example dates back to December 11, when the Chavismo-controlled Venezuelan parliament approved a law to repeal Venezuela’s membership in the Rome Statute, a move that ultimately paved the way for the country’s exit from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC). The ICC also closed its office in Caracas after pointing out the lack of cooperation from the authorities.
Turk made these considerations in his last report of the year, reviewing the most delicate and urgent cases on his work agenda. When we look at the Venezuelan case, the comments were not at all encouraging compared to his last report. “Since my last update on Venezuela, in June, things have not improved,” he said. “We continue to see widespread restrictions on freedom of expression and peaceful assembly; arbitrary arrests and enforced disappearances; as well as a serious social and economic crisis. » It is precisely the content of the June report which provoked the reaction of the National Assembly, proposing his departure from the country the following month.
The Austrian lawyer highlighted the emergency laws that the Chavista regime approved to expand the discretionary powers of the executive branch in the context of tensions with the United States, and expressed concern that the content and implications of these decrees remain unknown.
“In Venezuela, people’s freedoms have been intensified and stifled,” Turk said. “Public life has been militarized. My office has received reports of forced recruitment into the Bolivarian militia, even of teenagers and the elderly,” he denounced at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva. Equally alarming are reports that authorities are encouraging people to report loved ones, neighbors or loved ones via a state-sponsored mobile app.
Turk regretted the legal proceedings opened against journalists, human rights activists and opposition figures; the use of punitive and arbitrary anti-terrorism laws; and the terrible conditions of detention in Venezuelan prisons, in which five political prisoners recently died while in state custody. The official commented in particular on the case of opposition leader, former mayor and former governor of the state of Nueva Esparta, Alfredo Díaz, who died this month after a year in prison accused of conspiracy.
The breaking point between the Venezuelan state and international human rights bodies has been brewing for several years. Until about eight years ago, the Maduro regime sought to maintain cordial relations and some type of political dialogue with bodies such as the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner or the International Criminal Court. Its leaders were received by the revolutionary hierarchy and the exchange of impressions on what was happening in Venezuela seemed controlled by the rules of diplomacy.
But the patience of the Venezuelan regime began to wear thin – and with it that of UN officials – as the country’s socio-economic situation deteriorated and opposition protests escalated, leading to repression by security forces.
The first reports from Michelle Bachelet, UN High Commissioner between 2019 and 2022, on the humanitarian crisis and the degradation of political rights in Venezuela, also fell very hard on the top government. After speaking personally with Bachelet, on a red carpet, at the Miraflores Palace, Maduro called her a “liar” when he had access to the contents of this investigation. In 2021, the International Criminal Court announced that it would open an investigation against the Maduro regime for crimes against humanity.
The official response to these accusations was partial and, since this year, the break seems complete. On July 1, when Turk was declared a person unwelcome Because of his criticism of Chavismo’s methods, Jorge Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly, called the Austrian official a “hypocrite” and accused him of being an “accomplice” both in the genocide of the war in Palestine and in the kidnapping of the 252 Venezuelan prisoners deported from the United States and who ended up in the Anti-Terrorism Containment Center in San Salvador.
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