María Corina Machado would have left Venezuela this Tuesday with support from the United States. The opposition member left on a ship that left the western coast of Venezuela towards the Caribbean island of Curacao, US officials have revealed to the Wall Street Journal. His escape, apparently clandestine, occurred just one day before the Nobel Prize ceremony, so Machado did not manage to arrive in time to collect the award that was given to his daughter Ana Corina Sosa Machado. Her promise, as she herself communicated to the organization, is to appear in Oslo, which dispelled doubts about her whereabouts and concerns for her safety.
This is so far the most concrete information that has been published about the departure of the Venezuelan opposition leader. Rumors about the operation have been flying for days, fueled even by Chavismo itself, which spread that Machado had already been out of Venezuela for days. Speculation has placed her in a diplomatic vehicle crossing the border with Colombia and even escaping on one of the American planes that landed in the country to bring deported Venezuelan immigrants. There has also been speculation about whether or not his departure had the connivance of the regime.
The trip to Oslo was not easy. Machado has been in hiding for 16 months to avoid being arrested by the Government of Nicolás Maduro. More than a hundred of his collaborators are in prison and many others have had to hide or go into exile, to avoid being captured by Chavismo’s intelligence services.
Added to the difficulties of his departure is the uncertainty that he may return. In addition, to the direct persecution during the last year, Chavismo had banned her from leaving the country more than a decade ago, when she was a deputy.
The opposition leader’s allies, the Wall Street Journal notes, strove to keep the trip secret to protect her safety. In a phone call with the president of the Nobel Committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, published on the Peace Prize website, Machado stated that “many people” had risked their lives for her to travel to Oslo.
“I am very grateful to them. And this is an example of what this recognition means for the Venezuelan people,” she said, adding that she was about to board a plane. “We are very excited and very honored, and that is why I am very sad to inform you that I will not be able to make it to the ceremony in time, but I will be in Oslo. I am heading to Oslo right now.”
The Nobel Committee did not specify when the phone call took place or where Machado was at the time. Hours earlier, the director of the institute, Kristian Berg Harpviken, told Norwegian public broadcaster NRK that it had been more complicated than expected to transfer Machado to Oslo. “He lives with a death threat from the regime, pure and simple,” he declared. “It extends beyond the borders of Venezuela, by the regime and its associates around the world.”
In May, five of his main collaborators, sheltered for a year in the Argentine embassy in Caracas, heavily guarded by Maduro’s police, managed to leave in a secret operation with support from the United States, the details of which are still a mystery.
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