ICC prosecutor demanded the release of teenagers in Venezuela
Karim Khan, prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), urged this Monday the government of Nicolás Maduro to release the adolescents detained by state security agencies in the post-election protests and others. political prisoners in Venezuela.
«After this year’s elections I insisted in my communications with Venezuela and in public statements on the need to protect the rights of civilians, including children, who should be released if they are detained for political reasons or anyone who was peacefully protesting«, he expressed during his speech at the inaugural session of the Assembly of States Parties to the Rome Statute in The Hague.
He added that all lives matter equally. «Venezuelans have the same right to justice as the families I met in Libya or Bangladesh in the last two weeks. This is the most basic thing that can be said. But it is worth emphasizing.
“The ICC” is trending because prosecutor Karim Khan finally spoke about Venezuela:
“The children must be released”
“We have been working without delay”
“complementarity is running out of steam”
— Why is it a trend? (@estendenciavzl) December 2, 2024
He expressed concern about the lack of implementation of legal reforms in Venezuela and highlighted the urgency of accelerating justice efforts in the country.
“Complementarity cannot be an endless story. I have not seen the concrete implementation of laws and practices in Venezuela that I expected. That is why I want to make it clear that the ball is in Venezuela’s court. The path of complementarity is running out of steam,” Khan said.
He pointed out that the investigations carried out by his office for crimes against humanity committed in Venezuela They are moving forward “without delay” and that their team has been working “with focus” to accelerate their evidence collection activities “with a view to establishing concrete and clearly identified benchmarks and deadlines.”
Khan urged them to allow entry to the office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, as he had been promised in writing, “and they must cooperate more tangibly with my office.”
The ICC actively follows events in Venezuela
The ICC has been investigating alleged crimes against humanity for years that the government committed in Venezuela in 2017, during opposition protests in which more than 100 people died.
Furthermore, the prosecutor’s office CPI analyzes the complaints received after the presidential elections of July 28. «We are closely following current events in Venezuela following the presidential elections of July 28, 2024, and confirms that it is independently and impartially analyzing the information transmitted to it regarding allegations of crimes that may fall within the jurisdiction of the Cut,” the office said in September.
The Prosecutor’s Office revealed that it has made diplomatic representations at the highest level to the Maduro regime “to underline the importance of ensuring that the rule of law is respected at the current time and to emphasize that all people must be protected from violations that could constitute crimes of the Rome Statute.
Political prisoners in Venezuela
On Friday, the NGO Foro Penal, which leads the defense of political prisoners in the nation, indicated that 1,903 people remain imprisoned for dissenting from the government, most of them detained after the July 28 electionsin which Maduro was proclaimed the winner by the electoral body, a result described as “fraudulent” by the Democratic Unitary Platform, the largest opposition alliance.
On Sunday, opposition leader María Corina Machado called on Venezuelans, wherever they were, to ask the International Criminal Court – which is investigating the Caribbean country for alleged crimes against humanity – to act “now” so that there is “justice”.
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