Jan 9 (Reuters) – Venezuela has slowly begun releasing some of those held in jail who are considered political prisoners by rights groups and the opposition, in the aftermath of the U.S. capture of President Nicolas Maduro last weekend.
U.S. President Donald Trump said early on Friday: “Venezuela is releasing large numbers of political prisoners as a sign of ‘Seeking Peace.'” Venezuelan authorities have not said how many will be released or given their names.
As of Friday evening there had been at least nine confirmed releases, including five Spanish citizens and former opposition presidential candidate Enrique Marquez, said Foro Penal, a leading rights group. Foro Penal estimates there are still more than 800 political prisoners in Venezuela, including at least 80 foreign detainees.
Below are some of the high-profile prisoners in Venezuela:
Juan Pablo Guanipa
This well-known opposition politician – and ally of opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado – was arrested in May 2025 after months in hiding after he was accused of leading a terrorist plot, which he denies.
Venezuelan officials regularly accused the opposition of conspiring to commit terrorism, overthrow Maduro or attack the power grid.
Guanipa, a lawyer, was arrested days before Venezuela’s parliamentary elections last year.
“I don’t know what will happen to me in the coming hours, days and weeks. But I am sure that we will win this long fight against the dictatorship,” he said in a statement on social media following his arrest.
Freddy Superlano
Superlano is the former head of the Voluntad Popular party, part of Venezuela’s political opposition. He was retroactively disqualified by the Supreme Court from participating in the 2021 governor’s race in Barinas, the home state of late socialist President Hugo Chavez, in a contest that pitted him against Chavez’s brother. The opposition won the rerun of the vote.
His arrest after the 2024 election, captured on video, showed him being shoved into the back of an unmarked car surrounded by armed security agents.
Roland Carreno
Carreno is a journalist and former operations director for opposition party Voluntad Popular. He was arrested in August 2024 in Caracas by unidentified intelligence agents who approached him in vehicles without license plates, the party said following his detention.
At the time, Venezuela’s attorney general, Tarek Saab, said Carreno had been detained for alleged “participation in conspirative plans against the democratic peace.”
Carreno had previously been detained in October 2020 on charges of financing terrorism. He was released in October 2023 amid negotiations between Caracas and Washington.
Perkins Rocha
Rocha is a lawyer for the Vente Venezuela opposition movement and a close confidante of Machado. He was detained in August 2024 by unknown individuals who took him by force, the opposition movement said. Rocha also served as the spokesperson for Machado’s campaign.
“We keep moving forward, for Perkins, for all those jailed and persecuted and for all of Venezuela,” Machado said on X after the arrest.
Rafael Tudares
Tudares, 45, is the son-in-law of the opposition’s former presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez.
Tudares, an attorney who was not involved in politics and who is married to Gonzalez’s daughter Mariana, was detained in January 2025 in Caracas by masked men while driving his two young children to school.
His wife has been visiting detention centers since the releases were announced and says she does not know for sure where her husband is being held.
Javier Tarazona
Tarazona is the former director of local NGO FundaRedes, which tracks alleged abuses by Colombian armed groups and the Venezuelan military along the shared border. He was arrested in July 2021 alongside three other FundaRedes members, including his brother Jose Rafael Tarazona, after reporting to a state prosecutor that their team had been harassed by intelligence service officials.
Unidentified armed men waited for him at his hotel, the organization said on social media following his arrest. The three detainees were charged with instigating hatred, treason and terrorism.
(Reporting by Reuters, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)
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