Venezuela says it’s releasing a ‘significant number’ of prisoners as gesture to ‘seek peace’

El Helicoide, top, the headquarters of Venezuela's intelligence service and detention center, stands in Caracas, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026, after National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said the government would release a significant number of Venezuelan and foreign prisoners. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela released citizens and foreigners from its prisons on Thursday in what a top government official described as a gesture to “seek peace” less than a week after former President Nicolas Maduro was captured by U.S. forces to face federal drug-trafficking charges in New York.

Jorge Rodriguez, brother of acting President Delcy Rodriguez and head of the National Assembly, did not specify who they would be releasing or how many people would be released. But he said the release of prisoners “is happening right now.”

Venezuelan authorities have freed political prisoners before, but the releases on Thursday were the first ones since Maduro was deposed. Human rights groups were encouraged by the releases, but it wasn’t clear yet whether this might represent the early stages of a government in transition or more of a symbolic effort to please the Trump administration, which has allowed Maduro’s loyalists to stay in control.

While a group of journalists, lawyers and human rights activists were freed on Thursday, the number of prisoners to be released remained unclear.

“Consider this a gesture by the Bolivarian government, which is broadly intended to seek peace,” Rodriguez said in an announcement publicized over TV.

NGO: 863 detained for `political reasons’

Alfredo Romero, president of Foro Penal, an advocacy group for prisoners based in Caracas, praised Thursday’s release as “good news” that lifted Venezuelans’ hopes that all political detainees in the country may walk free.

But he stressed that he wanted this to become “the beginning of the dismantling of the repressive system” of Maduro’s government and not remain “a mere gesture, a charade of releasing some prisoners and incarcerating others.”

Despite a widespread crackdown during the tumultuous 2024 election -- in which the government said it detained 2,000 people -- Venezuela’s government denies that there are “political prisoners” and accuses those detained of plotting to destabilize Maduro’s government.

Romero’s organization said that as of Dec. 29, 2025, there were 863 people detained in Venezuela “for political reasons.”

The Spanish government announced Thursday that five Spanish citizens were among those released in Venezuela and would soon return to Spain.

Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares confirmed the group includes prominent Venezuelan-Spanish lawyer and human rights activist Rocio San Miguel. Speaking to Spanish broadcaster RNE, he also confirmed that Spanish citizens Andres Martinez, Jose Maria Basoa, Ernesto Gorbe and Miguel Moreno were freed.

Basoa and Martinez were arrested in Venezuela in September 2024, accused by officials of being involved in a plot to destabilize Maduro’s government as Spanish intelligence agents, allegations that Spanish authorities denied at the time. Spain’s El Pais newspaper reported Thursday that Gorbe had been living in Venezuela and was arrested in 2024, accused of being in the country illegally with an expired visa.

Families wait outside prisons

A number of families of those detained rushed to wait outside of a number of Venezuelan prisons on Thursday, hoping to reunite with their loved ones detained inside.

Pedro Duran, 60, was among those hoping to wrap his arm around his brother Franklin Duran as he waited outside a prison in the town of Guatire, around 25 miles (43 kilometres) outside of Caracas. Duran said his brother was detained in 2021 on charges of trying to overthrow Maduro’s government -- an accusation the family fiercely denies.

Duran, who has been living in Spain, heard rumors that the government may be releasing a number of detainees on Wednesday and immediately bought a plane ticket from Madrid to Caracas to find his brother.

“I don’t have words to express the emotion I’m feeling,” Duran said. “We’re feeling a lot of hope ... We’re just waiting now.”

Despite the anticipation, fear persists in parts of the South American country as residents brace for an uncertain future.

“Of course everyone here is very scared, but what more could they (the government) do to us that they haven’t done already,” he said.

`A bargaining chip’

Ronal Rodriguez, a researcher at the Venezuelan Observatory at the University of Rosario in Bogota, Colombia, said the government periodically releases prisoners at politically strategic moments.

In July last year, Venezuela released 10 jailed U.S. citizens and permanent residents in exchange for getting home more than 200 migrants deported by the Trump administration to El Salvador, where they were held in a prison built to hold alleged gang members.

“The regime uses them (prisoners) like a bargaining chip,” he said, adding that he and other observers will be watching not just how many people the government releases, but also whether high-profile individuals are included or if they’re being released under a condition of house arrest.

Little movement was immediately seen outside one of Venezuela’s most notable prisons, where a number of the detainees are held.

On Wednesday, the Trump administration sought to assert its control over Venezuelan oil, seizing a pair of sanctioned tankers transporting petroleum and announcing plans to relax some sanctions so the U.S. can oversee the sale of Venezuela’s petroleum worldwide.

Both moves reflect the administration’s determination to make good on its effort to control the next steps in Venezuela through its vast oil resources after U.S. President Donald Trump pledged after the capture of Maduro that the U.S. will “run” the country.

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Jorge Rueda and Megan Janetsky, The Associated Press

Janetsky reported from Mexico City.