Venezuela, US clash again over political prisoners
CARACAS: Venezuela and the United States locked horns again over political prisoners held by Caracas, including a jailed opposition leader whose supporters took to the streets of the capital on Saturday to demand his release. Hundreds of opposition supporters marched in Venezuela’s capital city, blocking one of the main highways in Caracas to protest Leopoldo Lopez’s imprisonment.
Lopez, in a letter he wrote in his cell read out to supporters, urged an electoral “rebellion” to press for general elections in the country mired in economic and political crisis. Referring to gubernatorial elections set for last December that were delayed and not yet rescheduled, Lopez called instead for a referendum on whether the presidential election set for 2018 should be held in 2017 instead. Supporters called for Venezuelans to press for change.
“His only crime was to demonstrate non-violently. And now, more than 80 per cent of Venezuelans want (President Nicolas) Maduro to leave power,” said David Smolansky, mayor of metro Caracas’ El Hatillo district.
Smolansky said the elected socialist Maduro’s government amounted to a dictatorship that makes “Venezuelans go hungry while it protects criminals,” he stressed, adding: “We urge the international community: no more dictatorship. We want to live in a free country where decency can overcome violence.”
The State Department issued a new call for the release of Lopez and other dissidents, days after the Venezuelan Supreme Court upheld his imprisonment.
Lopez is serving a nearly 14-year sentence on charges of inciting unrest at anti-government protests in 2014.
“We call for the immediate release of all prisoners of conscience, respect for the rule of law, the freedom of the press, the separation of constitutional powers within the government, and the restoration of a democratic process that reflects the will of the Venezuelan people,” the department’s acting spokesman Mark Toner said in a statement.