Venezuelan minister for interior, General Remigio Ceballos, talking with repatriated Venezuelans migrants just minutes after their arrival to Venezuela from the United States. Photo: X/@remigioceballos1.
With the phrase “the American dream became a tragedy,” Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro denounced this Monday the mistreatment of Venezuelan migrants in the United States, where, according to testimonies of those repatriated through the Vuelta a la Patria plan, are treated as “criminals, murderers and terrorists.”
“Our fellow Venezuelans have been very mistreated in the United States, we have a set of evidence of the mistreatment they are subjected to in prisons as if they were criminals. A boy who was imprisoned for a year says, what crime did I commit? No crime! Just being a migrant and believing in the American dream that turned into tragedy. Another was imprisoned for seven months with psychological torture, feed frozen or rotten food. Is this how people are treated? ” Maduro questioned.
During the broadcast of the program Con Maduro+ the president reiterated that, on many occasions, the migrant population fell into the trap of a network of “coyotes” linked to opposition politicians Carlos Vecchio, David Smolansky, Leopoldo LĂłpez and Juan GuaidĂł, who after demanding payments of several thousand dollars, “they deceive them, they rob them along the way … they pass them through the Texas border and they remain prisoners there.”
President Maduro called on Venezuelans to thing carfully and not believe “in siren songs or fairy tales about the American dream.”
He also recalled that the US government had allocated $2.8 billion to help Venezuelan migrants, but that none of them had seen any of that money, which is why he called on US taxpayers to demand audits from their government to find out what was really done with that money.
The Venezuelan president reported that this Monday, October 24, the second flight of repatriated migrants from the United States landed in Venezuela. The first flight took place on Wednesday, October 18.
A total of 111 Venezuelans returned from the United States in this flight, raising the number of repatriated migrants to 238.
Minister for Internal Relations, Justice and Peace, Remigio Ceballos, reported that the 111 men and women returned to Venezuela voluntarily and safely, “after holding conversations with the US government, we coordinated the necessary mechanisms to carry out this new flight of the Vuelta a la Patria plan.”
Likewise, Ceballos added that once they arrive at the Simon Bolivar International Airport in Maiquetia, the repatriated migrants are subjected to medical examinations and checkups, in order to provide them with all their requirements so that they can reintegrate into society.
#23OCT || Un total de 111 hombres y mujeres procedentes de #EEUU, pisaron suelo venezolano la tarde de este lunes, como parte del Plan Vuelta a la Patria que impulsa el Gobierno Bolivariano.#ElEsequiboEsVenezolano pic.twitter.com/lnXh9gTpR3
— MPPRIJP (@MijpVzla) October 24, 2023
Lifting of sanctions
As the “beginning of a path that must be permanent,” President Maduro described the partial lifting of sanctions on Venezuela’s oil, gas and gold industry, announced last Wednesday through the publication of general licenses by the Treasury Department of the United States. He stressed that this action must lead to the “total lifting of sanctions on Venezuela.”
In reference to the agreements signed between the Venezuelan government and the opposition groups belonging to the Unitary Platform, he said that, on his part, it is an act of good faith and “we will not do anything to harm it.” However, he stressed that “when you sign with the devil, sooner or later he does his misdeeds.”
“Yes, we must sign with the devils for the peace and progress of Venezuela, we signed,” he said, calling on the extreme right to “stop conspiracy and blackmail.”
(Alba Ciudad) with Orinoco Tribune content
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/JRE
