Penal Forum to relatives of political prisoners: Be careful with expectations regarding possible releases
The NGO Penal Forumwho leads the defense of political prisoners in Venezuela, called on Thursday to the relatives of those detained after the post-election crisis to maintain prudence in expectations regarding possible releasesafter the Prosecutor’s Office promised to expedite the procedures, according to relatives of those deprived of liberty.
«My appeal specifically to the families of those imprisoned for political reasons, at this time: Be careful with expectations, because, furthermore, no one ever knows what criteria are used to validate who ends up released from prison and who does not. This is something important,” said the vice president of the NGO Foro Penal, Gonzalo Himiob, at a press conference.
The activist asked to wait a little and said that I hope as many people as possible are released, especially those who have a delicate health condition.
Prosecutor’s Office is committed to expediting processes for political prisoners
On Tuesday, relatives of those arrested assured, upon leaving a meeting with the attorney general, Tarek William Saab, that The Public Ministry promised to expedite the processes of those detained after the presidential elections on July 28.
«The attorney general attended to us today. (He said) that the trials were beginning, that good things were coming for the boys, that the innocent are going to come out and look for the reality of all this,” Theany Urbina, mother of one of the 69 teenagers detained in the context of the post-election crisis.
Dionexis García, mother of another teenager who has been imprisoned for more than three months, hopes that from now on the process will be faster and releases will be granted, eventually under the figure of precautionary measures or dismissal of the cases, scenarios that – she said – were discussed in the meeting.
According to the Penal Forum, there are 1,976 political prisoners in Venezuela, of which 1,848 were detained after the presidential elections on July 28.a process in which the majority opposition, grouped in the Democratic Unitary Platform, assures that its candidate, Edmundo González Urrutia, won by a wide margin, despite the fact that the National Electoral Council proclaimed the victory of Nicolás Maduro.
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