María Corina Machado demanded this Friday the immediate release of all political prisoners in Venezuela "before more die," after it became known that the regime concealed for more than nine months the death in state custody of Víctor Hugo Quero Navas, a 51-year-old street vendor who was arrested on January 1, 2025.
In a video posted on X, the opposition leader and 2025 Nobel Peace Prize laureate urged "democratic governments, public officials, international organizations, and all conscientious individuals to demand the immediate release of all political prisoners in Venezuela and the dismantling of the regime's torture centers, before one more innocent Venezuelan dies in state custody."
"‘For Víctor Hugo and for Carmen, it was already too late,’ expressed Machado, also referring to Carmen Teresa Navas, the mother of the deceased, who is 81 years old and spent 16 months desperately searching for her son in jails and institutions."
Machado detailed the chain of abuses: "They forcibly disappeared him, imprisoned him without due process, took him to a torture center, tortured him, let him die in custody, buried him without informing his family, and for more than nine months, they concealed his death from his mother."
The opposition member directly pointed to the acting president Delcy Rodríguez as the person responsible: "The decision was made by the Venezuelan regime and by the officials in charge of the penitentiary system who operate under the authority and command of Delcy Rodríguez."
He also described it as "a final act of cynicism and cruelty" that the regime denied amnesty to Quero Navas knowing he was already dead.
The Ministry of Penitentiary Services confirmed this week that Quero Navas has been detained in El Rodeo I prison, near Caracas, since January 3, 2025, transferred to a hospital on July 15 of the same year due to "upper gastrointestinal bleeding and acute febrile syndrome," and that he passed away on July 24, 2025, from "acute respiratory failure secondary to pulmonary thromboembolism."
The body had been buried in secret in a cemetery in the southeast of Caracas, in a shared grave with a paper tombstone, without the family being notified.
This Friday, the Prosecutor's Office ordered the exhumation of the body, which took place in the presence of Carmen Navas, who visually identified her son's remains.
The Office of the Ombudsman had incorrectly reported in October 2025 that Quero Navas was in El Rodeo I, when he had already been dead for three months, which exacerbated the allegations of institutional cover-up.
The case generated an immediate reaction in Washington. Republican Senator Rick Scott demanded that the United States reimpose sanctions on Delcy Rodríguez, accusing the regime of "kidnapping, torturing, isolating, and murdering" Quero Navas.
The Trump administration had removed Rodríguez from the OFAC sanctions list on April 1, 2026, after formally recognizing her as head of state, a decision that generated tensions with some sectors of Congress.
The Voluntad Popular party also denounced the modus operandi of Rodríguez's regime: releasing political prisoners under precautionary measures that prevent them from exercising their political rights and, in some cases, with travel bans.
Venezuelan former prisoners have reported systematic torture in the detention centers of the regime, a pattern that Machado demands to be dismantled immediately.
According to non-governmental organizations, 27 individuals detained for political reasons have died in the custody of the Venezuelan state since 2014, and at least eight political prisoners have died in Venezuelan prisons since July 2024.
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