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Venezuela: Persistent and Worsening Human Rights Conditions

Disclaimer

This post is for informational and educational purposes only. I am a law graduate (J.D./LL.M.) but not yet licensed to practice law in the United States. Nothing in this post constitutes legal advice. Each case is unique, and individuals should consult with a licensed attorney regarding their specific circumstances.

Why This Matters

Venezuela continues to experience grave human rights violations. This post provides evidence-based documentation to support asylum cases and inform the public — locally and internationally — about the reality of repression in the country.

As a recent law graduate (J.D./LL.M.) with a focus on human rights and immigration law, and now as a scholar, I aim to present facts grounded in credible reports from international bodies and Venezuelan civil society.

Despite years of international scrutiny, Venezuela remains a country where dissent is criminalized, civil society is under siege, and fundamental freedoms are curtailed not only through repression on the streets but also by legal frameworks designed to silence opposition.

Arbitrary Detentions and Political Prisoners

Civil society groups consistently report widespread arbitrary detentions.

Movimiento Vinotinto documented 156 new political prisoners between May and July 2025 during “Operación Tun-Tun,” a series of raids often carried out at night and without judicial orders.

Foro Penal reported over 800 political prisoners held in mid-2025, with numbers rising to more than 900 at times.

“These detentions are not isolated. They are part of a systematic policy.” — UN Fact-Finding Mission (2025)

Case Spotlight: Pedro Hernández

On September 16, 2025, human rights defender Pedro Hernández, director of the NGO Campo and honorary member of Movimiento Vinotinto, was detained by the Policía Nacional Bolivariana in Yaracuy. The next day, his father (Pedro Hernández Serrano) and wife (Natalia Álvarez) were also arrested. This case exemplifies how the state targets defenders and their families, extending repression beyond the individual.

Enforced Disappearances and Torture

Amnesty International’s report Detentions Without a Trace (July 2025) documented at least 15 enforced disappearances after the 2024 elections. Victims were held incommunicado, denied legal access, and often subjected to torture.

Human Rights Watch confirmed this pattern in April 2025, describing enforced disappearances, torture, and even killings carried out by Venezuelan security forces.

Extrajudicial Killings and Use of Force

According to PROVEA’s 2024 Annual Report, security forces killed at least 522 people in 2024. Over the last five years, more than 6,400 people have died in similar operations.

These killings, often carried out in poor neighborhoods, violate Venezuela’s obligations under the ICCPR and the American Convention on Human Rights, which both guarantee the right to life.

Repression of Expression and Digital Rights

Repression has expanded into the digital space.

  • Movimiento Vinotinto reported that 90% of human rights defenders reduced their online activity out of fear, and 33 websites were blocked after the 2024 elections.
  • VE sin Filtro documented 79 digital blockages during and after the elections.
  • Espacio Público continues to track intimidation of journalists, with dozens of cases reported in 2025.

Psychological Impact on Civil Society

The impact of repression is not only physical.

Movimiento Vinotinto’s Manual de Primeros Auxilios Psicológicos shows how “Operación Tun-Tun” created lasting trauma. Human rights defenders, union leaders, and journalists report anxiety, depression, and fear that silence activism even when individuals are not physically detained.

Accountability Before the International Criminal Court (ICC)

Venezuela is currently under one of the ICC’s most significant ongoing investigations in Latin America.

  • The Court has opened Venezuela I, focusing on alleged crimes against humanity committed since at least April 2017.

Although Venezuela is not the only country under ICC investigation — other situations include Libya, Myanmar/Bangladesh, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Afghanistan — it is one of the few in Latin America to face this level of scrutiny.

Why this matters for asylum claims ICC investigations involve evidence-gathering, victim testimonies, and official records, many of which align with findings from NGOs and UN bodies. For asylum seekers, this demonstrates that credible international institutions recognize the risk of crimes against humanity in Venezuela — strengthening claims of persecution or credible fear.

Restrictive Legal Framework and Family Punishment

Repression in Venezuela is not only carried out through security forces on the streets — it is also codified into law, creating a legalized framework for silencing dissent. These laws transform ordinary acts of political opposition, expression, or association into criminal offenses, giving authorities sweeping discretion to detain, prosecute, and punish.

Ley Constitucional contra el Odio (2017)

Publicly presented as a law to “promote tolerance,” the Ley Constitucional contra el Odio, por la Convivencia Pacífica y la Tolerancia has become one of the most powerful tools of political persecution.

  • Article 11 permits banning political parties accused of “promoting hatred,” an undefined and vague concept that authorities interpret broadly to eliminate opposition movements.
  • Articles 13 and 14 criminalize speech deemed to incite “hatred” in media and on social networks, punishable by prison terms of up to 20 years.

From a human rights standpoint, this law institutionalizes the persecution of political dissent by blurring the line between legitimate expression and punishable crime. It directly contravenes Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which protects freedom of opinion and expression, and Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights (ACHR). In practice, the law enables criminal prosecution of journalists, human rights defenders, and even ordinary citizens for critical posts on social media.

Reform of the Código Orgánico Procesal Penal (2021)

The 2021 reform of the Código Orgánico Procesal Penal (COPP) further entrenches state control over the judiciary and increases the scope of arbitrary detention.

  • Article 237 expands the grounds for pretrial detention, allowing judges to order imprisonment on vague allegations of “predelictual conduct,” undermining the principle of presumption of innocence.
  • Article 230 authorizes preventive detention for up to two years, extendable by one additional year, even before trial. This effectively normalizes long-term imprisonment without conviction.

This reform violates the ICCPR, Article 9 (prohibition of arbitrary detention) and Article 7 (prohibition of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment). It also clashes with Article 8 of the ACHR, which guarantees due process and judicial protections.

Institutionalized Repression

Together, these laws create what scholars of authoritarianism call “authoritarian legality” — the use of legal frameworks to legitimize what are in fact systematic human rights violations. By criminalizing dissent and authorizing prolonged detention without trial, the Venezuelan state has legalized the conditions under which torture, cruel treatment, and political imprisonment become routine.

For dissidents, journalists, or human rights defenders, these laws mean that ordinary acts of free expression or association can trigger years of imprisonment, often accompanied by inhuman treatment. From the perspective of asylum law, they establish a clear risk of severe persecution upon return, since repression is not arbitrary but embedded in the legal system itself.

Family Punishment

Beyond targeting individuals, Venezuela also practices collective punishment against family members of dissidents. Relatives of Lieutenant José Ángel Rodríguez Araña, a military dissident, have been arbitrarily detained solely because of their family ties. Movimiento Vinotinto’s Escala de Riesgo study identifies this as part of a broader pattern known as Sippenhaft, or family-based retaliation.

This practice not only violates the principle of individual criminal responsibility under international law but also magnifies the climate of fear, silencing communities by threatening not only the activist but also their loved ones.

Migration and Regional Impact

Repression and economic collapse have driven mass displacement. By mid-2025, the R4V platform (UNHCR/IOM) reported 6.87 million Venezuelans displaced across Latin America and the Caribbean.

This is one of the largest migration crises in the world, reflecting both the collapse of rights and the lack of protection inside Venezuela.

Passport Cancellations Targeting Dissidents

Venezuelan authorities have increasingly used passport annulments to restrict the movement of perceived opponents—journalists, human rights defenders, and opposition figures—especially since the disputed July 28, 2024 election. Credible reporting shows a pattern of cancellations without prior notice, often discovered only at the airport where documents are confiscated and travel is blocked.

In its post-election analysis, the IACHR documented a new pattern of “abrupt and arbitrary” passport cancellations targeting at least 40 human rights defenders, social leaders, journalists, and relatives. Some passports were confiscated at Maiquetía airport, while others were discovered canceled only when individuals checked SAIME’s website. The IACHR also noted persecution of 102 poll watchers and election observers, with at least five reportedly fleeing to Colombia after death threats.

Not a New Tactic: Documented Since 2017–2018

While the practice intensified after 2024, it predates the most recent election cycle. In September 2018, the well-known journalist Nelson Bocaranda reported that SAIME annulled his valid, extended passport at Maiquetía and retained the document, preventing him from traveling. Local outlets covered the incident at the time and noted similar episodes involving media figures. Civil society analyses from 2018 also warned that arbitrary passport annulments were restricting freedom of movement.

Human Rights Assessment & Asylum Relevance

Arbitrarily canceling a valid passport—particularly when selectivelyapplied to critics—violates freedom of movement under ICCPR Article 12 and reflects state-sponsored persecution. As an administrative tool, it is a low-costbut effective method to punish dissent, impede safe exit, and force irregular migration routes, thereby compounding protection risks. The IACHR’s explicit call to restore revoked passports underscores that these practices lack lawful basis and form part of a broader campaign of repression recognized by international bodies. For asylum purposes, this evidence supports both nexus(political opinion/activism) and well-founded fear arguments.

Targeting Exiles: What Passport Annulments Mean for Dissidents Abroad

When authorities void the passports of dissidents already outside Venezuela, the harm doesn’t stop at the border—it extends repression extraterritorially and triggers a cascade of rights impacts:

  • Freedom of movement (ICCPR art. 12; ACHR art. 22; UDHR art. 13): Arbitrary cancellation of a valid passport restricts travel, visa renewal, and transit to safe states—and can obstruct the right to enter one’s own country (ICCPR art. 12(4)).
  • Punishment by exile: Blocking renewals or voiding passports penalizes political opinion and chills advocacy abroad—consistent with persecution, not a neutral administrative act.
  • Documentation limbo: Without a valid passport, people face barriers to employment, banking, housing, education, civil registration, and essential services in host countries—creating de facto statelessness–like conditions even if nationality remains intact.
  • Consular retaliation / denial of protection: Refusals to issue, extend, or replace passports, signal that the state is unwilling to protect the individual (probative in refugee analysis).
  • Family unity & humanitarian impact: Voiding travel documents can block family reunification, prevent cross-border medical care, and expose relatives to reprisals—reinforcing the Sippenhaft pattern.

Why this matters for asylum & protection

  • Demonstrates state capacity and intent to harm beyond borders, reinforcing well-founded fear and nexus (political opinion/activism).
  • Supports the argument that return would expose the person to further persecutionand arbitrary restrictions on movement and due process.
  • Where available, Convention Travel Documents (1951 Refugee Convention) or humanitarian/temporary protectionsmay mitigate risk—seek individualized legal counsel.

What evidence to keep (for case files)

  • Screenshots from SAIME showing cancellation/error messages.
  • Airport/airline records (confiscation or denial of boarding).
  • Official notices, consular emails/correspondence, and witness statements.
  • Proof of retaliation context (activism, journalism, HRD work; threats; prior detentions, complaints).

Passport annulments abroad are not clerical glitches; they are rights-restricting measures used to silence dissent and punish exile, recognized in international human-rights practice as part of broader patterns of persecution.

Conclusion

The evidence is overwhelming. Venezuela continues to experience arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, censorship, and laws that erode due process. International observers, including the UN Fact-Finding Mission, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch, confirm that many of these violations amount to crimes against humanity.

For asylum seekers, these findings provide vital country-condition evidence. For the international community, they are a call to recognize that repression in Venezuela is not easing — it is evolving.

Quick Reference Evidence Box: Venezuela Country Conditions

United Nations

Amnesty International

Human Rights Watch

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR)

U.S. Department of State

Venezuelan NGOs & Civic Monitors

Restrictive Legal Framework (Primary Law Texts)

  • Ley Constitucional contra el Odio, por la Convivencia Pacífica y la Tolerancia, Gaceta Oficial, No. 41.274 (Nov. 10, 2017) (Venez.).
  • Ley Orgánica de Reforma del Código Orgánico Procesal Penal, Gaceta Oficial, No. 6.644 Extraordinario (Sept. 17, 2021) (Venez.).

Accountability Before the International Criminal Court (ICC)

  • Int’l Crim. Ct., Situation in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela I, No. ICC-02/18 Venezuela I

Passport Cancellations Targeting Dissidents

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