Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado left her country this week in a covert operation that lasted 15 to 16 hours and included wearing a wig as a disguise, a boat trip in rough seas and the participation of U.S. rescue experts, officials told the U.S. press. She was taken to Norway, where she was reunited with her family after the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony.
Bryan Stern, a former member of the US special forces and director of the Gray Bull Rescue Foundation, which works in the field of rescues, described this action as one of the most complex and rewarding ever carried out by him and his team.
In an interview with CBS News, Stern said most of the voyage was at sea and with high waves that made navigation uncomfortable, but strategically favorable. Indeed, the rough ocean makes radar detection difficult, which, for the team, was an advantage.
“The higher the wave, the harder it is to see. That’s how it works,” he told CBS, calling the operation a daunting task. “We were all very wet. My team and I were soaked to the skin. She (María Corina) was also very cold and wet.”
Also speaking to CBS, Stern said more than 20 people were working on different fronts, including intelligence, translation, logistics and navigation. Many others collaborated indirectly, some “without knowing that they were helping” in the transport of María Corina.
According to him, the operation was organized in haste. Despite months of prior preparation for actions on Venezuelan territory, there were only four days of direct planning for the expulsion of the activist from the territory commanded by Nicolas Maduro.
Nobel Prize winner for her pro-democracy activism, María Corina lives in hiding and was in an unknown location. The operation began in Venezuela and Stern declined to reveal details for security reasons.
After being taken to an embarkation point, María Corina was transferred to a fishing boat which took her to a meeting point on the open sea. In the middle of the night, under a dark moon and clouds making visibility difficult, Stern welcomed her for a 13 to 14 hour crossing to a confidential location. From there, she took a flight to Oslo, the Norwegian capital, according to CBS.
The rescue, he explained, was financed by “a few generous donors”, without any participation, he said, from the US government. Stern said there was informal collaboration with the U.S. military simply to avoid incidents because ships on the high seas could be mistaken for targets.
In recent weeks, more than 20 boats have been bombed in Caribbean and Pacific waters by U.S. forces, in actions that left more than 80 people dead. Donald Trump’s government, which has provided no evidence, claims the ships were used for drug trafficking.
The US president was aware of María Corina’s transportation project, although the president’s degree of involvement is unclear, according to the Wall Street Journal. According to the publication, the operation was tense and María Corina had to wear a wig as a disguise in her own country.
The group would have passed through ten military posts, without the activist being identified, according to a person close to the operation mentioned by the Wall Street Journal.
María Corina arrived in Norway after the Nobel Prize ceremony on Wednesday (10). Addressing the audience, Jorgen Watne Frydnes, chairman of the committee, said the opposition leader had faced “a trip in a situation of extreme danger.” His daughter received the award on behalf of the opposition leader and said the winner “will return very soon” to Venezuela.
In Caracas, the regime’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, accused María Corina of promoting “American imperialist interests” by plundering Venezuela’s natural resources. “The show failed. You didn’t come,” she said. The Venezuelan Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, declared that the opponent would be considered a fugitive if she left the country.
María Corina declared this Friday (12) that the transition in Venezuela is underway. “The transition is coming and we are focused on an orderly and peaceful transition,” he said in an interview with journalists in Oslo. The activist stressed that Maduro would leave power whether or not there is a negotiated transition.
According to people close to the opponent, she should reduce the pace of engagements and rest in the following days. The day before, Thursday (11), the Venezuelan said she had received help from the Trump administration to leave her hiding place in the Latin American country and travel to the European continent.
She, who remains close to the sectors aligned with the American president, repeated this Friday that “it is very clear that the Venezuelan crisis is a priority for the security of the United States.” And he also said he feared for his life during the operation to leave his country.
“There were times when I felt like my life was actually in danger, and it was also a very spiritual time because at the end of the day I just felt like I was in God’s hands.”
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