Relatives of detained protesters held vigil

Almost twenty relatives of detainees in the Tocorón prison, in the state of Aragua, held a vigil this Thursday near the penitentiary center forto demand the “immediate” freedom of his relatives and the rest of the political prisoners that -they denounce- there is in the country.

In the vicinity of the prison, mainly women gathered to also ask for an end to the “persecution”, which opponents claim intensified after the presidential elections on July 28, in which Nicolás Maduro was proclaimed the winner by the electoral body, a result branded as fraudulent by the majority anti-Chavismo.

The protesters, who had papers with the faces and names of detainees, They lit dozens of white candles with which they formed the word ‘freedom’ on the floor, and they also put up posters with messages such as “Christmas without political prisoners in Tocorón.”

EFE/ Committee for the Freedom of Political Prisoners

Relatives of detainees ask to God for his deliverance

One of them, Sonia Mujica, said that the mothers are united “in prayer for the early freedom” of their children, whom she described as “political prisoners of the State,” according to a video shared on the social network X by an NGO.

Another of the women who were at the scene and who spoke in the video, although she did not identify herself, also expressed that “all the relatives of the political prisoners held in the Tocorón penitentiary center are united.” in one sense, mainly, asking God for the “prompt release” of those close to him.

EFE/ Committee for the Freedom of Political Prisoners

That penitentiary center, in addition to the one known as Tocuyito (Carabobo state), was intervened last year by the government in an operation against criminal gangs that operated from these and other prisons in the country, among them, the ‘Aragua Train’.

These two prisons were converted this year into “maximum security” detention centers to lock up “all the guarimberos (violent protesters),” according to Maduro said last August, after multiple protests broke out against the official result of the elections. which left, according to official figures, more than 2,400 detainees and 27 deaths.

The NGO Foro Penal estimates a total of 1,958 prisoners for “political” reasons – the vast majority detained after the elections – of which 69 are minors, aged 14 to 17, always according to the NGO.