Venezuela’s release of detainees Thursday briefly brought relief and guarded optimism to a country consumed by uncertainty.
But it was another, less covered news event far afield that some Venezuelan advocates said offered their only real shot at justice as long as the government of former President Nicolás Maduro remained intact.
A federal court in Argentina Thursday ordered the judiciary to press on with investigations into alleged crimes against humanity committed by members of Venezuela’s national guard, turning down an appeal by a former officer who argued that Argentina had no jurisdiction to go after Venezuelan officials.
Judges demanded that Argentina pursue the case under the doctrine of universal jurisdiction, whereby human rights violators of any nationality can be charged in any country, no matter where the crimes were committed, according to a copy of the ruling obtained by The Associated Press.
Lawyers said the timing of the court decision sent a message.
After attacking Venezuela and seizing its president to stand trial in the U.S., the Trump administration surprised Venezuelans and the international community by endorsing Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s handpicked deputy who oversaw the feared intelligence service, to lead the transition.
“We cannot lose our focus at this moment,” said Ignacio Jovtis, director for Latin America at InterJust, an organization seeking accountability for international crimes and representing three of the Venezuelan plaintiffs. “Victims in Venezuela are still waiting for justice.”
Whatever relief Venezuelans felt seeing Maduro in handcuffs Saturday “has nothing to do with the process of bringing truth and reparation to victims and trying perpetrators for crimes against humanity,” he added.
From cruel dictatorship to judicial success story
It’s no coincidence that this investigation is progressing in Argentina, experts say, a country that has learned a thing or two about prosecuting a strongman from its groundbreaking efforts bringing to justice the brutal military dictatorship that oversaw the killing or disappearance of as many as 30,000 Argentines from 1976 to 1983.
Over 1,200 ex-army officers have been tried and sentenced in Argentina, many to life in prison, and hundreds more await trial.
As one of just a handful of countries whose law permits the investigation of crimes-against-humanity cases beyond its borders, Argentina has increasingly taken center stage in lawsuits ranging from the torture of dissidents under Franco’s dictatorship in Spain to atrocities committed by the military against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.
Venezuelans take hopes for accountability to Argentina
Frustrated by the impunity in their home country and the limits of the laboriously slow International Criminal Court, Venezuelans have taken their quests for justice to Argentina.
Thursday’s criminal complaint accuses 14 Venezuelan National Guard officers of human rights abuses dating to 2014, when security forces under Maduro aggressively stamped out anti-government protests, arresting, torturing and killing suspected dissidents.
Argentina began investigating the allegations in 2023. A catalogue of torture was spelt out in court as former detainees and families of protesters killed in the crackdown flew to Buenos Aires to give testimony.
Last year, Justo José Noguera Pietri — a key defendant and former commander of Venezuela’s national guard — asked the Argentine judiciary to dismiss the case and void the outstanding arrest warrant against him. A federal appeals court denied his requests Thursday, citing the “extreme gravity” of the alleged crimes.
“For us, this is not a symbolic investigation,” Jovtis said. “We want the perpetrators to go before an Argentine judge and be tried here.”
A separate Venezuelan case filed recently in Argentina targets ousted President Maduro, hard-line Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello and other top officials still in power. An Argentine judge asked for the extradition of the defendants this week.
Democracy deferred
Argentine President Javier Milei, a right-wing ideologue and President Donald Trump’s most loyal Latin American ally, joyously celebrated the capture of the leader he long lambasted as the ultimate political evil.
A staple on the global conservative speaking circuit, Milei has long been friendly with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado and last October attended the ceremony in Norway that awarded her the Nobel Peace Prize.
As U.S. Special Forces whisked Maduro out of Venezuela, Milei issued a triumphant statement calling for “everything to be set right and for the true president to take office, Edmundo González Urrutia ” — the candidate widely considered the legitimate winner of the country’s turbulent 2024 election.
But as Trump froze out Machado and elevated Rodríguez, Milei changed his tune.
All mentions of democracy were scrubbed from Argentina’s official statements on Venezuela. In their Tuesday telephone call about the situation, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Argentine counterpart spoke only about “cooperation to confront narcoterrorism.”
Maduro’s gone, but repression remains
On the streets of Caracas, the initial jolt of euphoria after Maduro’s capture last Saturday has rapidly worn off, turning into a more familiar, nagging dread. Pro-government paramilitary groups known as “colectivos” have been deployed across Caracas.
“Right now in Venezuela, everybody’s erasing their phones because ‘colectivos’ are checking to see if you’ve been tweeting or looking at anything anti-government,” said Ricardo Hausmann, a professor of the practice of international political economy at the Harvard Kennedy School. “There is too much talk about oil and money, but for Venezuelans to do anything, they need rights.”
Trump, preoccupied with the prospect of extracting Venezuela’s oil riches, had only praise for Rodríguez’s government in an interview with Fox News late Thursday.
Source : https://apnews.com/article/argentina-venezuela-trump-maduro-milei-5121d5506734904d15c5014d743dea32
