分类： world

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – Nearly two months after walking free from a Venezuelan prison following 448 days of detention on disputed political charges, Argentine national Nahuel Gallo is urging the international community to ramp up pressure on Venezuela’s interim government to secure the release of hundreds of people still jailed for political motives.

The 35-year-old was released on March 1, more than 14 months after he was arrested at a Venezuelan immigration checkpoint in December 2024 while traveling to meet his Venezuelan partner and their toddler son. At the time of his arrest, the country was still under the control of now-ousted former President Nicolás Maduro, who leveled accusations of espionage and terrorist activity against Gallo that he has repeatedly denied.

Gallo shared a harrowing account of his detention in exclusive comments to the Associated Press, detailing systematic abuse and inhumane conditions he endured while held at the Rodeo I prison. From his initial interrogation by Venezuelan military counterintelligence agents to his eventual release, Gallo described a pattern of violence, psychological torment, and neglect that still haunts him months after gaining freedom.

Upon his arrest, agents found WhatsApp conversations between Gallo and his partner discussing Venezuela’s volatile political and economic situation, which prompted immediate accusations of dissent. When a search of his phone uncovered contacts linked to Argentine judicial agencies, officers labeled him a spy outright. Gallo recalled being threatened with death, with a gun pressed to his skull and a Taser held to his body as agents threatened to throw him from a moving truck during interrogations. He said he was repeatedly beaten and kicked while handcuffed in the early days of his custody.

Nearly three weeks after his arrest, then-Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek William Saab publicly announced formal charges that Gallo had participated in “terrorist actions” against the Maduro government.

Transferred to Rodeo I prison to serve out his pre-trial detention, Gallo faced conditions that tested his ability to survive. As a foreign detainee, he was barred from receiving any outside visits, and he was cut off from all contact with Argentine consular officials for more than a year. He was given only limited access to medical care, and all inmates were restricted to just a few minutes per day for bathing, washing clothing, and using restroom facilities. Prison guards regularly sprayed detained people with pepper spray as punishment and intimidation, according to Gallo’s account.

It was only after a full year of detention and a sustained hunger strike that Gallo was finally allowed his first phone call with his partner. For him, the worst abuse was not the violence inflicted on him directly, but the helplessness of watching other prisoners tortured nearby.

“The greatest torture is seeing something being done to someone else and not being able to do anything,” Gallo said.

Following Maduro’s ouster and capture by U.S. forces in January, interim President Delcy Rodríguez took power and pledged to implement sweeping democratic reforms. Her government has previously denied allegations of systematic human rights abuses in Venezuelan prisons. This week, National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez – the interim president’s brother – announced plans to release 300 detainees, a number that includes many detainees classified as political prisoners by international human rights organizations.

Despite this announced reform, critics warn that hundreds of people remain behind bars solely for their political views, a reality that leads Gallo to argue Venezuela’s old repressive system remains largely intact. Even after his release, Gallo says he still feels imprisoned until every one of his former fellow inmates is freed.

“I think we’re still imprisoned until our fellow inmates are freed,” Gallo said. Before he left Rodeo I, he recalled, his cellmates shared one simple plea: “Gallo, don’t forget about us.”

That promise has shaped Gallo’s work in the weeks since he returned to Argentina. He has turned to social media to shine a light on the abusive conditions inside Venezuelan prisons and advocate for the release of all remaining political detainees. “The person who’s still inside is waiting for the one who got out to do something,” he explained.

On Thursday, Gallo met with U.S. Ambassador to Argentina Peter Lamelas in Buenos Aires. After the meeting, Lamelas released a statement reaffirming the U.S. position that the former Maduro regime “used the arbitrary detention of foreign citizens as a tool of political repression.”

BOGOTA, Colombia – Fresh deadly inter-communal violence has sparked a major security deployment in southwestern Colombia, after a long-running territorial dispute between two Indigenous groups erupted into open conflict that left multiple people dead and dozens more injured.

On Thursday, violent clashes broke out in a rural zone of Cauca department’s Silvia municipality, pitting the Misak and Nasa Indigenous communities against one another. Both groups have laid overlapping claims to the same parcel of land, a source of simmering tension that has persisted for months. By Friday morning, official preliminary counts put the death toll at seven people, with more than 110 others wounded – most hit by gunfire. Defense Minister Pedro Sánchez cautioned that the number of fatalities and casualties could climb in the coming hours as rescue teams reach isolated areas of the conflict zone.

In response to the violence, Colombian national security forces launched a large-scale deployment to the region on Friday. The national army announced via social media that more than 500 infantry soldiers, backed by air support, have entered the Silvia area to restore public safety for local residents and prevent further escalation of the conflict. The deployment aims to separate the rival groups and create a secure environment for dialogue to resume.

Tensions between the two communities first began to rise in April of this year. Colombia’s state-run National Land Agency has been involved in the dispute since that time, taking part in formal mediation sessions and technical working groups designed to resolve ambiguity over the official territorial boundaries between the two Indigenous groups. In the wake of Thursday’s violence, the agency repeated its call for both communities to set down weapons and return to the negotiating table to resolve their differences through peaceful dialogue rather than armed confrontation.

The violence drew swift international reaction: the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights’ Colombia mission released a statement Thursday calling for an immediate end to hostilities and urging national authorities to launch a full investigation into the violence, holding all those responsible for deaths and injuries legally accountable.

The region where the clashes occurred already faces significant security challenges, with multiple illegal armed factions active across Cauca department. Among these active groups are dissident units of the former Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) that refused to disarm under the terms of the landmark 2016 national peace agreement with the Colombian government. These armed groups often exacerbate local tensions over land and resources to extend their own control over territory in remote rural areas.

Decades of fragile, strained relations between the United States and Cuba have plunged to new lows in recent weeks, following a series of aggressive moves by the second Trump administration that have put the Caribbean nation on high alert for potential military intervention.

Since his return to the White House, US President Donald Trump has openly stated his goal of ousting Cuba’s current ruling leadership, even speculating publicly that the island’s government is on the brink of collapse. In March, he claimed Cuba was mired in deep crisis and teased the possibility of a so-called “friendly takeover” of the country. While no formal military invasion plans have been announced, heightened surveillance activity in the region has amplified Cuban anxieties. Over the past seven days, US military aircraft have intentionally kept their flight transponders active while operating near Cuban airspace, broadcasting their positions publicly on global flight-tracking platforms. Dr. Steve Wright, a UK-based expert in unmanned aerial and surveillance technology, called the choice to leave transponders enabled almost certainly intentional, noting the move is designed to send an unambiguous message that US intelligence maintains constant oversight of the island as it ramps up pressure.

The most provocative recent US action came this week, when federal prosecutors unsealed an unprecedented murder and conspiracy indictment against 94-year-old Raúl Castro, Cuba’s former president and the symbolic “Leader of the Cuban Revolution.” The charges stem from a 1996 incident in which Cuban fighter jets shot down two small civilian aircraft operated by Brothers to the Rescue, a Miami-based Cuban exile group. Four people, three of them US citizens, were killed in the incident. Washington has long maintained the planes were shot down over international waters, while Cuba has consistently argued the aircraft entered its sovereign airspace after repeated incursions that posed a national security threat. Along with Raúl Castro, five other Cuban figures face charges including conspiracy to kill US nationals, murder, and destruction of US aircraft; a conviction could carry a life sentence or the death penalty. Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche said the charges reflected that the US “does not, and will not, forget its citizens,” but Cuban leaders have denounced the indictment as a baseless political gambit to justify military action. Cuba’s current president Miguel Díaz-Canel called the prosecution “a political manoeuvre, devoid of any legal foundation,” reaffirming that the 1996 downing was a legitimate act of self-defense within Cuban national waters.

Experts and Cuban officials note the indictment is a deliberate strike at the heart of Cuba’s ruling structure. While Díaz-Canel formally holds both the presidency and leadership of the Cuban Communist Party, the Castro name remains the most powerful symbolic and political force on the island, commanding deep loyalty within the military and security services that dominate Cuban politics and economics. Raúl Castro, who led the country from 2008 to 2018 after decades as defense minister under his older brother Fidel, remains the figurehead of the 1959 revolution that established the island’s anti-imperialist, one-party communist system. The Cuban military’s sprawling conglomerate GAESA controls most of the island’s key economic assets, underpinning the power of the ruling political-military elite. In a recent video address to the Cuban people, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio argued that GAESA operates as a “state within a state,” controlled by a corrupt, incompetent elite that blocks reform and any potential rapprochement with the US. Rubio confirmed that the White House prefers a diplomatic resolution to the current standoff, but said Trump retains the right and obligation to respond to any purported US national security threat, adding that the probability of reaching a peaceful agreement is “not high.” Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez has dismissed Rubio’s comments as an attempt to “instigate a military aggression.”

Beyond the legal charges, the most impactful pressure on Cuba has come from a total US oil blockade and sweeping new sanctions that have crippled the island’s already fragile economy. For years, Venezuela and Mexico supplied the vast majority of Cuba’s crude oil and fuel, but both halted shipments after the Trump administration removed Venezuela’s sitting president in January and threatened tariffs on any country that sent petroleum to Havana. Since the blockade was implemented, only one Russian oil tanker has successfully delivered fuel to the island, leaving Cuba facing chronic fuel shortages that have sparked months of widespread, hours-long blackouts across the country. Shortages of food, medicine, and basic goods have also reached crisis levels, forcing hospitals to scale back critical care and forcing schools and government offices to close repeatedly. Public discontent has boiled over into repeated street protests across the capital Havana, including a demonstration this week where demonstrators blocked roads with burning debris and chanted anti-government slogans. This month, the US added new sanctions targeting senior Cuban officials in the energy, defense, finance, and security sectors, accusing them of human rights abuses and corruption.

Washington has also offered $100 million in humanitarian aid to Cuba, but attached strict conditions requiring the aid be distributed through the Catholic Church and independent non-governmental organizations, completely bypassing the Cuban government. The Trump administration says Cuba has rejected the aid, but Rodríguez countered that Cuba does not refuse assistance offered in good faith, and the most meaningful help the US could provide would be lifting the blockade entirely.

Unconfirmed intelligence reports published by US news outlet Axios have further escalated tensions, claiming that Cuba holds roughly 300 combat drones and is planning potential strikes on US targets including the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Key West, Florida, and US naval vessels operating in the region. The report also claimed Iranian military advisors are present in Havana, an allegation Cuban officials have dismissed as part of a fabricated pretext for military intervention. Rodríguez has repeatedly emphasized that Cuba “neither threatens nor desires war” but is fully prepared to repel any external aggression.

Backchannel talks between the two governments were confirmed by both sides in March, but Cuba has so far responded only with formal public condemnation of US actions, characterizing the entire campaign as “collective punishment” of the Cuban people. Two of Cuba’s key international allies, China and Russia, have both spoken out against US actions, with Beijing calling on Washington to end its coercion and threats, and the Kremlin saying the pressure on Cuba “borders on violence.” As the blockade continues and rhetoric hardens on both sides, the Caribbean faces one of its most severe security crises in decades.