Zapatero meets with Delcy Rodríguez and celebrates her amnesty in Venezuela
The speaker of parliament tells relatives of political prisoners that all will be released before Friday
BarcelonaVenezuela's acting president, Delcy Rodríguez, received former Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero at Miraflores Palace, the seat of government in Caracas, on Friday evening. He was invited to participate in a program aimed at promoting a dialogue process in the South American country. The state-run television channel Venezolana de Televisión (VTV) broadcast images of the meeting, which also included the president of the National Assembly and the acting president's brother, Congressman Jorge Rodríguez, without providing details of the conversation. The Venezuelan presidency explained in a statement that the Chavista leader received the former Spanish president "as part of the Bolivarian diplomacy of peace, which reaffirms brotherhood, dialogue, and solidarity."
Rodríguez Zapatero, who has mediated negotiations between the Venezuelan government and opposition, as well as several prisoner releases in the South American country, will conclude his visit this Saturday, according to opposition deputy Timoteo Zambrano, with whom he also met.
Amnesty imminent
The former Spanish president expressed feeling "great confidence" in Delcy Rodríguez and, in statements to Efe, considered that the amnesty proposed by her for political prisoners held since 1999, when Chavismo came to power in Venezuela, will mark "a before and after" in the South American country, and promised to help her in the South American country.
The amnesty bill was introduced on January 30.Amid a gradual release of political prisoners that began on the 8th of the same month, almost a week after the capture of Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, by US forces in the capital, the amnesty excludes crimes such as serious human rights violations, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. The Speaker of the Catalan Parliament assured the families of political prisoners, who were holding a vigil outside a Caracas police station, that the second debate on the amnesty law would take place on Tuesday and that "between next Tuesday and, at the latest, Friday, everyone will be free." The legislation was approved in the first of the two debates required for its passage. Once it is definitively approved in the second debate, Rodríguez said that "everyone will be released that same day."
