Alleged Venezuelan gangsters released from mega jail in US prisoner swap
A Venezuelan man looks to the sky as he boards a plane in El Salvador bound for Venezuela - El Salvador's presidential press office via AP
Nayib Bukele, the country’s president, said in a post on X that those freed in Venezuela were en route to El Salvador from where they would continue “their journey home”.
“Today, we have handed over all the Venezuelan nationals detained in our country, accused of being part of the criminal organisation Tren de Aragua (TDA). Many of them face multiple charges of murder, robbery, rape, and other serious crimes.
“As was offered to the Venezuelan regime back in April, we carried out this exchange in return for a considerable number of Venezuelan political prisoners, people that regime had kept in its prisons for years, as well as all the American citizens it was holding as hostages,” he said.
Soldiers stand guard as people board the plane
Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, confirmed the release of “10 Americans who were detained in Venezuela” and thanked Mr Bukele for his help in securing the agreement.
“The regime’s use of unjust detention as a tool of political repression must end,” he said.
The State Department posted on social media a picture of what it said were 10 Americans freed from Venezuelan prisons.
The men, in matching dark blue T-shirts and jeans, together held up an American flag.
The ten freed American men
The Venezuelan government confirmed that 252 Venezuelans held in El Salvador had been freed, calling the maximum security prison where they have been held, Centre for the Confinement of Terrorism or Cecot, a “concentration camp”.
The Venezuelans were sent to El Salvador in March after Donald Trump invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to deport alleged members of the Tren de Aragua gang without going through normal immigration procedures.
Family members of many of the Venezuelans and their lawyers deny they had gang ties, and say they were not given a chance to contest the Trump administration’s allegations in court.
Venezuela’s government has always decried the detention of its citizens as a violation of human rights and international law. But the government’s critics say the country holds activists and opposition figures in similar conditions in Venezuela.
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