Venezuelan police have arrested Javier Tarazona, director of human rights group Fundaredes, two days after he alleged that members of the government had ties with illegal armed groups from Colombia.
Police rook Tarazona and and three others on Friday in the northwestern state of Falcon.
#Tarazona and three others were detained after reporting Friday morning to the state’s prosecutor that their team had been harassed by intelligence service officials and unidentified armed men had been waiting for him at the door of his hotel, the organization said on its Twitter account.
“We demand that the integrity and life of these four people be respected, as well as the integrity and life of FundaRedes activists and volunteers,” said Clara Ramirez, FundaRedes’ documentation and human rights coordinator
“It is alarming that the Venezuelan state maintains a policy of intimidation, threat and harassment against human rights defenders,” she said.
#FundaRedes has been one the region’s most active entities documenting and denouncing abuses by #Colombian armed groups in border areas and their illegal trafficking and mining activities.
The group also denounced extrajudicial executions of civilians at the hands of #Venezuelan police forces and the displacement of hundreds of inhabitants of Apure in search of refuge in Colombian territory.
This week Tarazona was at the headquarters of the prosecutor’s office in Caracas, to request that the alleged links between government officials and irregular armed be investigated.
