The kidnapped

By: Luis Gonzales Posada - 21/03/2025

Peruvian Foreign Minister Ambassador Elmer Schialler has denounced the Venezuelan government before the UN Human Rights Council for kidnapping four Venezuelan citizens: Ricardo Cubas Mendoza, Renzo Humanchumo Castillo, Ricardo Meléndez, and Marco Madrid, arrested 120 days ago by agents of the Bolivarian intelligence service.

Despite the long period of time that has passed and repeated requests for information made through the Brazilian embassy, which represents us, to this day we do not know whether our fellow citizens are alive, dead, or in prison.

Plagiarism has become an infamous state policy of the Chavista regime, despite the fact that it is an extremely serious crime, classified as a "crime against humanity" by the Statute of the International Criminal Court.

However, kidnapping is common in Venezuela, so much so that a month and a half ago, Richard Granell, President Trump's emissary, traveled to Caracas to ask Maduro to release seven Americans, a humiliating request that the dictator granted. Now, Mauricio Claver-Carone, head of diplomatic relations with Latin America, is seeking the release of nine more of his compatriots.

In this context, let us remember that the son-in-law of Edmundo González Urrutia, winner of the July 2024 presidential election, was also kidnapped on January 7 while on his way to school with his minor children and remains missing to this day.

On the subject, González Urrutia told former presidents Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia and Felipe González of Spain that the dictator is "vilely blackmailing" him and has recently revealed the names of numerous civilians and military personnel in captivity, all accused, without any evidence, of "treason, conspiracy with foreign governments, and criminal association."

More broadly, he maintained that "recent cases follow the same patterns: arbitrary detentions, masked officials, forced disappearances, incommunicado detention, isolation, denial of the right to a private attorney, clandestine trials without the family's knowledge, denial of due process, lack of access to healthcare, and complete isolation from the outside world. This is nothing less than kidnapping," he concluded.

However, the Chavista regime rejoices in this criminal practice, as did Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, boasting that "120 foreigners are detained for destabilizing acts."

Those affected are of 17 nationalities, including Peruvians, and none of them are being held under a prosecutor's order or facing legal proceedings.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has expressed his "deep concern over the arbitrary detention and persecution of opponents," and the European Union has demanded "the immediate release of the hostages," demands that have received no response from Caracas.

Furthermore, for a year now, six members of leader María Corina Machado's campaign command have been sheltering in the Argentine embassy residence in Caracas, currently in hiding, without the government's permission to leave the country.

The house is surrounded by tanks and snipers. Water and electricity services have been cut off, and the entry of food is restricted.

The question we ask, then, is why do Western democracies bow down to these criminal acts and maintain full diplomatic relations with a spurious regime that systematically violates human rights, murdering, torturing, and imprisoning thousands of people? Are they not aware that by maintaining these ties, they are legitimizing a tyranny?

The regime's Prosecutor's Office also acknowledges that more than 2,400 people were arrested in the context of the protests against the fraud in favor of Maduro, of whom, according to official sources, 1,515 have been released. That is, there are almost 1,000 people in prison, an approximate figure because there are no precise reports of the number behind bars.

In this sordid context, we have not heard the voice of Donald Trump or his foreign minister, Marco Rubio, who have only cared for their kidnapped compatriots but have not sought the freedom of dozens of citizens of other nationalities or raised their voices against this abhorrent practice.

The International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, approved by the United Nations on December 20, 2006, which contains 45 articles, establishes in its second paragraph that kidnapping falls into that criminal category.

However, this rule is flagrantly flouted by the Maduro regime, and the response of the community of nations has been and continues to be astonishingly weak.

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