Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado is now free after have been “intercepted” at a protest in Caracas on the eve of President Nicolas Maduro’s inauguration, according to her political team.
The politician is expected to address the country in the coming hours, her team Comando con Venezuela also said
In a later update, her team posted that “during the period of her kidnapping she was forced to record several videos and was later released.”
Fear of repression in Venezuela has escalated in recent days as the inauguration date for Maduro’s third term approaches on Friday, following last year’s contested presidential election.
The Venezuelan government has denied detaining Machado, however.
Speaking at a pro-government protest, Venezuela’s Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello accused the opposition of “lying that the government had captured Maria Corina” for publicity.
Machado’s appearance at the rally was her first public appearance in months, since a government crackdown on Venezeulan opposition figures and their supporters following the vote. “I am here,” she posted on X earlier on Thursday, along with a video of herself at the protest, wearing jeans and the colors of the Venezuelan flag.
In video distributed by Reuters on Thursday afternoon, a figure purported to be Machado wades through a crowd of protesters in Caracas, wearing a black motorcycle helmet and jacket. The demonstrators jostle and follow the figure, some shouting “Viva Venezuela!”
From another angle, Reuters footage captures the same figure on the back of a motorbike, riding down a busy street in Caracas as demonstrators run in its wake
Asked what would happen if she were arrested earlier this week, Machado acknowledged the risk. “We’re taking one day at a time, Isa. I am quite conscious of my responsibilities. But also, we know that this is a cost that transcends every single one of us. So, we need to do this. I am going to be with our people tomorrow,” she told CNN’s Isa Soares.
Panama’s president José Raúl Mulino denounced Machado’s apparent detention on X soon after the news broke. “Panama demands full freedom of @MariaCorinaYA, as well as respect for her personal integrity,” Mulino wrote. “The dictatorial regime is responsible for her life!”
Rival protests throughout Caracas
Rival groups of demonstrators gathered throughout Venezuela’s capital Caracas on the eve of the inauguration.
In several parts of Caracas on Thursday, crowds of opposition supporters slowly swelled with people waving flags and calling for libertad (freedom). Supporters were also seen holding “Gonzalez Presidente” signs and blowing vuvuzelas.
Meanwhile in Venezuela’s largest barrio Petare, Maduro supporters also assembled in what they call a “march for peace and joy.”
Maduro was proclaimed winner of the presidential election in July by electoral authorities under the tight control of the ruling Socialist Party.
But Venezuela’s opposition, led by Machado, published thousands of voting tallies claiming that their own candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, had actually won the vote with 67% against Maduro’s 30%.
Independent observers such as the Carter Center and the Colombian Electoral Mission, as well as CNN’s own analysis, have since found the opposition tallies to be legitimate.
Gonzalez, who has vowed to return to Caracas this week despite the threat of arrest, started the day in the Dominican Republic where he met the Dominican President Luis Abinader and other regional former leaders.
“We Venezuelans will soon regain our freedom,” Gonzalez said in a speech in Santo Domingo.
