Venezuela’s Post-Election Crackdown Was Filled With Human Rights Abuses
The United Nations (U.N.) has accused Nicolás Maduro’s Venezuelan government of committing “gross human rights violations” in the wake of July’s disputed presidential election. According to a report released Tuesday, the regime’s security forces were responsible for killings, forced disappearances, and physical, psychological, and sexual torture.
“The reactivation of the most violent mechanisms of the State’s repressive apparatus led to serious human rights violations and crimes, in what constituted one of the country’s most acute crises in recent years,” the U.N.’s Independent International Fact-Finding Mission stated in its 161-page report.
According to the investigation, the crimes were “instigated by the highest civilian and military echelons of the state, including President Maduro.” The mission confirmed that at least 25 people, including at least two minors, were killed in the post-election violence. At least a third of these killings were carried out by Maduro’s security forces or by government-backed groups.
Beyond the deaths, thousands of Venezuelans were injured, arbitrarily arrested, or forcibly disappeared. Many of the detentions occurred without warrants, and detainees were routinely denied access to legal representation. They were threatened with torture to force confessions to terrorism, treason, and other crimes. The torture methods include beatings, electric shocks to the genitals, suffocation with plastic bags, immersion in cold water, and sleep deprivation.
Among the detainees were
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