Venezuela: Extrajudicial Killings in Poor Areas | WPN World People News

A Venezuelan police unit has been carrying out extrajudicial executions and arbitrary arrests in poor communities that no longer support the Nicolás Maduro government, Human Rights Watch said on Sep 18, 2019.

Since the creation of the unit Special Actions Force of Venezuela (Fuerza de Acciones Especiales, FAES) as a branch of the Bolivarian National Police in 2017, police with the unit have engaged in serious human rights violations with impunity. Its abusive policing practices in low-income communities are consistent with a pattern Human Rights Watch and Provea, a Venezuelan human rights group, found in 2016 of widespread allegations of abuses by security forces of ordinary citizens during what was known as the “Operation to Liberate and Protect the People” (Operación de Liberación y Protección del Pueblo, OLP).

“In the midst of an economic and humanitarian crisis that is hitting the poor the hardest, Venezuelan authorities are resorting to egregious abuses in low-income communities that no longer support the Maduro regime,” said José Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. “In a country where the justice system is used to prosecute opponents instead of to investigate crimes, Venezuelan security forces are taking justice into their own hands, killing or arbitrarily arresting people they say have committed crimes, without showing any evidence.”

In June and July 2019, Human Rights Watch interviewed witnesses or family members of nine victims of violations by FAES in Caracas and a state in the interior, as well as lawyers, activists, and journalists covering alleged killings by the unit. Human Rights Watch also reviewed death certificates in four cases that were consistent with the sources’ accounts and reports by local human rights organizations and independent media outlets. The methods used by the Special Actions Force and the circumstances of the killings in the cases Human Rights Watch documented are consistent with the pattern identified by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and local human rights groups.

Police and security forces have killed nearly 18,000 people in Venezuela in instances of alleged “resistance to authority” since 2016. Interior Minister Néstor Reverol reported in December 2017 that there were 5,995 such cases in 2016 and 4,998 in 2017. Venezuelan security forces killed nearly 7,000 people in incidents they claimed were cases of “resistance to authority” in 2018 and the first five months of 2019, according to the government figures.

Nobody has yet compiled detailed information as to how many of these killings by security forces have been extrajudicial executions, but OHCHR concluded that “information analyzed by OHCHR suggests that many of these killings may constitute extrajudicial executions.”

OHCHR investigated 20 cases of people killed between June 2018 and April 2019 in depth, hearing nearly identical reports that FAES agents fatally shot young men during arrests in circumstances in which lethal force was not necessary to protect life. The UN agency concluded that “taking into account the profile of the victims, the modus operandi of the security operations, and the fact that the Special Actions Force often maintains a presence in the communities after the operation ends, OHCHR is concerned that authorities may be using FAES and other security forces as an instrument to instill fear in the population and to maintain social control.”

In all cases Human Rights Watch investigated in depth, armed FAES agents were dressed in the unit’s black uniforms. In several cases, they wore ski masks, arrived in black pickup trucks without license plates, and burst into homes in low-income neighborhoods. The agents often took family members of the victims outside before carrying out the killings. In some cases, agents stole food and other items difficult to find during Venezuela’s economic and humanitarian crisis.

In every case of killings that we investigated, family members said that FAES manipulated the crime scene and evidence. Agents planted arms and drugs or fired their weapons into walls or the air to suggest the victim had “resisted authority.” After some killings, family members said, they had difficulty obtaining their loved ones’ bodies, autopsy reports, or death certificates.

In one case, the agents used electric shocks on a detainee, beat and kicked him, and covered his head with a plastic bag in which they had sprayed a chemical substance that made his face and throat itch and swell. Such treatment amounts to torture. The agents believed the man had stolen a motorcycle belonging to a Special Actions Force commander’s wife, the man told Human Rights Watch.

In six cases OHCHR documented, those killed by FAES were government opponents or people perceived as such. Agents executed them during raids after anti-government protests. Since January, many of these protests have been in support of Juan Guaidó, the National Assembly president, who is challenging the legitimacy of Maduro’s presidency. These executions fit the same pattern as most of the killings Human Rights Watch reviewed, as well as those OHCHR documented.

Most of the killings Human Rights Watch reviewed are consistent with the abusive policing practices that several security agencies have used for years. Between 2015 and 2017, Venezuelan security forces swept through low-income communities during the OLP. Participating security forces included the Bolivarian National Guard; the Bolivarian National Police (PNB); the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (SEBIN); the Scientific, Penal, and Criminal Investigative Police (CICPC); and state police.

These raids resulted in widespread allegations of violations such as extrajudicial killings, mass arbitrary detentions, mistreatment of detainees, forced evictions, destruction of homes, and arbitrary deportations. In November 2017, Venezuela’s then-attorney general said security forces had killed more than 500 people during the raids. Government officials repeatedly said the victims were armed criminals who had died during “confrontations.” In many cases, witnesses or families of victims challenged these claims. In several cases, victims were last seen alive in police custody.

Human Rights Watch found no evidence that Venezuelan judicial authorities properly investigated any of the cases documented. Many victims fear retaliation if they report crimes or do not trust that authorities will investigate. In four of the cases, judicial or police authorities did not wait for the conclusion of a formal investigation before declaring that the victims were criminals.

Venezuelan authorities told the OHCHR that five FAES agents were convicted on charges including attempted murder for crimes committed in 2018, and that 388 agents were under investigation for crimes committed between 2017 and 2019. But OHCHR also reported that “[i]nstitutions responsible for the protection of human rights, such as the Attorney General’s Office, the courts and the Ombudsperson, usually do not conduct prompt, effective, thorough, independent, impartial and transparent investigations into human rights violations and other crimes committed by State actors, bring perpetrators to justice, and protect victims and witnesses.”

When the Special Actions Force was created in 2017, Maduro said its purpose was to combat crime and terrorism and “protect the people” from “criminal organizations and terrorist groups promoted by the criminal right.” Its parent agency, the PNB, is part of Venezuela’s Interior Ministry, which Néstor Reverol has led since 2016. Reverol reports directly to Maduro.

Instead of investigating widespread allegations of human rights violations by the agency, Venezuelan authorities have defended it, Human Rights Watch found. On July 17, 2019, Maduro chanted “Long live the FAES!” and expressed full support for the agency’s “daily work to bring safety to the Venezuelan people.”

Human Rights Watch shared this information with the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, who in February 2018 opened a preliminary examination into the situation in Venezuela to determine whether a full investigation by the court is merited. In September 2018, the governments of Argentina, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Paraguay, and Peru asked the ICC prosecutor to investigate potential crimes against humanity in Venezuela dating as far back as February 12, 2014. Costa Rica, France, and Germany later added their support to this request.

“These FAES killings are committed in the context of systematic brutality by Venezuelan security forces that has gone unpunished in Venezuela for years,” Vivanco said. “The lack of judicial independence only reinforces the cold reality that there is no hope for any credible accountability for these crimes in Venezuela.”

Source:Human Rights Watch