GENEVA, January 27, 2023 — Venezuelan investigators and a prosecutor went to the home of journalist José Gregorio Meza, editor of the independent El Nacional which exposes corruption, and took him away for questioning, and the authorities summoned four more journalists as well as Miguel Otero, the head of the newspaper, who is living in exile in Madrid.
“It seems that the Maduro regime has no shame in such brazen acts of intimidation of independent journalists even as United Nations human rights chief Volker Türk has just begun an official visit to the country,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, an independent non-governmental human rights organization based in Geneva.
“We urge the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to condemn the Maduro regime for its illegal actions, in blatant violation of freedom of the press, which make it increasingly difficult to practice journalism in Venezuela. He should also call on Venezuela to free more than 200 political prisoners, who are being held in arbitrary detention in breach of international law.”
