Venezuelan Government Confirms Arrest of Journalist Roland Carreño, Critic of Maduro

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Venezuelan journalist Roland Carreño, television host and well-known social events chronicler, has been imprisoned since Monday night. The news was confirmed by the government of Nicolás Maduro on Tuesday night.

The recently appointed Minister of Communication, Freddy Ñáñez, stated on Twitter that Carreño “was captured in the act and confessed his involvement in crimes against the constitutional order to disturb the peace of the Republic.”. The Chavista leader, however,gave no further details about Carreño, who is an activist and coordinator of the Popular Will (Vontade Popular), Leopoldo López’s party.

Several NGOs and journalists claim that the journalist was sent to the Bolivarian Intelligence Service (SEBIN) facilities, known as ‘El Helicoide’, although other sources say that he is in the confines of the National Bolivarian Police and has been able to speak with his attorney. The Chavista regime has not officially pressed charges. The National College of Journalists and the National Union of Press Workers (SNTP) are conducting a vigorous campaign to obtain information about Carreño’s whereabouts and to have him released.

The journalist was arrested in the context of opposition leader Leopoldo López’s escape from the Spanish Embassy residence in Caracas on Saturday, a fact that angered the government of Nicolás Maduro. After Leopoldo López’s escape, the Venezuelan political police interrogated Venezuelan workers at the Spanish Embassy in Caracas for information. Diosdado Cabello, Chavismo’s number two, criticized the alleged complicity of the Spanish ambassador in Caracas, Jesús Silva, in his exit from the country.

A militant of the Popular Will since its inception in 2009, Carreño has progressively abandoned his public profile as a television journalist and event host to become involved in training activities and political commitment. Particularly since 2014, when Maduro came to power, as the country began to crumble and the end of democracy became obvious to many.

Carreño has taken on important tasks and has developed a special closeness to the López family circle, of which he has become a close associate in recent years. Along with him, two Popular Will activists, Elías Rodríguez and Yeferson Sarcos, are also missing. At about the same time that Carreño was arrested, SEBIN also arrested Nathaly Sifontes, sister-in-law of Diana López, Leopoldo’s sister, to face an interrogation. Sifontes was summoned to testify at the El Helicoide facility and was eventually released several hours later.

Source: El País

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