Deaths from post-election repression in Venezuela reach 22

When he learned that the National Electoral Council (CNE) had declared Nicolás Maduro the presumed winner of the presidential election on July 28, Dorian Rondón cried. “Six more years of misery. Until when?” a relative heard him say as he lamented. That is why, the next day, he went to a post-election protest in Antímano, west of Caracas, where neighbors had gathered to protest the election result they considered fraudulent. In the evening, The 22-year-old was the victim of a chaseHe was missing for hours. His relatives lor found dead on the morning of July 30 on the side of a road in Las Adjuntas, also west of the Venezuelan capital.

Rondón’s relatives said that in the afternoon he went to the demonstration that was repressed by officers of the Bolivarian National Police. Then, he went to his grandmother’s house in Macarao to get clothes and go to his mother’s house, who lived in the community of El Guanábano, on the old road to Los Teques. He set out with his younger brother and several of his friends who also protested. They all went on motorcycles.

When the young men passed through the Las Adjuntas roundabout, around 10:00 pm, they heard some gunshots. They could not see where they were coming from, but they were being pursued on motorcycles. They were going for them. Everyone scattered to escape. Dorian disappeared. He did not reach his mother’s house or that of any other relative.

Relatives began to look for him in police stations and hospitals, but they did not find him. Through WhatsApp, They received a photograph of a corpse found in Las AdjuntasHe was wearing the same clothes as Rondón, the bag with his clothes and money, and had a gunshot wound to the neck. He was still wearing his motorcycle helmet, but it was gone.

Rondón’s family and friends suspect that the murder is linked to the post-election protest. The young men who accompanied him had to take shelter because the Directorate of Strategic and Tactical Actions (DAET) – belonging to the Bolivarian National Police and which repressed several demonstrations in Antímano – began publishing photos of the young men, whom they described as “guarimberos” from an electoral centre in Macarao.

With Dorian Rondón, there are now seven fatalities from post-election repression in the Capital District. They were all shot dead.

Another of the victims confirmed by Victim Monitor is Gabriel Ramos, 33, who was shot in the head on July 29 in the San Jacinto roundabout in Maracay during a protest in front of the Army’s 42nd Parachute Brigade. Through reports from journalists and media in the region, it was confirmed that the military headquarters fired at the protesters. In that incident alone, there were six deaths.

With the murders of Rondón and Ramos, the number of dead now stands at 22 amid post-election protests that have been taking place since the evening of July 28.

The military is responsible for the largest number of deaths: eight cases representing 36% of the total. Six of these homicides are attributed to the Army for the events in Maracay, while two other deaths are attributed to the Bolivarian National Guard.

The colectivos are the alleged perpetrators of six murders during the post-election repression, and the police are the ones responsible for two. In one of the cases, police and colectivos acted together. The perpetrator in five of the deaths has yet to be determined.

Although he was not included in the list, Victims Monitor The case of a woman is yet to be confirmed who died after the actions of a Venezuelan state security body.