The U.S. Attorney's Office has filed formal charges this Thursday against the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, for alleged crimes of torture against people in custody, including U.S. citizens, within a "system of repression that resorted to violence against political opposition, arbitrary detention, and torture of detained individuals."
In the indictment document, the Southern District of New York Attorney's Office places Maduro and his wife at the head of a "violent power structure" used to "consolidate power" and that relied on systematic methods of torture. "This torture included electric shocks, asphyxiation, rape, forced nudity, prolonged isolation, deprivation of food, punishment cells, and psychological torture, such as threats to harm or kill the victims' relatives, including their children," detailed the Attorney's Office.
According to the accusation, Maduro and Flores would have promoted and allowed these repressive mechanisms with the aim of illicitly accumulating "enormous wealth and power, rewarding their allies with illegally obtained funds and terrorizing their supposed opponents through persecution and violence."
The U.S. Attorney's Office maintains that this framework relied on the control of the armed forces, the judiciary, and the main state security agencies in Venezuela, and also mentions "alliances with organized criminal groups, including terrorist organizations and state-sponsored gang groups."
The court document states that Maduro would have configured this system along with several high officials who gave orders for "assassinations" or to apply torture, always with the knowledge of the Venezuelan president, who would have been at the head of an "agency responsible for torturing dozens of victims" and would have even "personally approved" illegal detentions and the subjection to torture of specific individuals.
These new charges are added to those already weighing on the Venezuelan leader for his alleged involvement in a network dedicated to smuggling drugs into the United States. Maduro, for his part, has declared himself innocent of all accusations made to date and maintains that any attempt to arrest him lacks legal basis.