Venezuela releases dozens of prisoners following meeting between Trump and interim leader– abcnews.com

BOGOTA, Colombia — Human rights groups in Venezuela said that significant numbers of political prisoners were released in the South American country on Saturday, though the total number of those freed has still not been determined.

The prisoner releases follow a meeting Tuesday between Interim President Delcy Rodríguez and President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York. In her speech at the UN, Rodríguez said Venezuela, whose government has been widely accused of jailing dissidents, stealing elections and stifling freedom of speech, has “begun a process of democratic transformation.”

In a message posted on X, the Venezuelan human rights group Clippve said seven political prisoners were released from a prison on the outskirts of Caracas on Saturday morning, including Wilder Vasquez, a university student who had been sentenced to five years in prison for participating in a 2018 plot to kill former President Nicolás Maduro. Vasquez has long claimed he was innocent. His sentence had expired in 2023.

In another X message, the human rights group Justicia Encuentro y Perdon said that 29 people were released from Venezuelan prisons Saturday, including 12 inmates who were on its list of political prisoners.

“Seventeen of those freed were not in our database of political prisoners,” the organization said. “Our team continues to verify information to update our registry.”