El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele has offered to repatriate 252 Venezuelans deported by the US and detained in his country if Venezuela releases the same number of political prisoners. Bukele appealed directly to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro via a post on social media. He stated that the Venezuelan deportees had committed crimes such as rape and murder, while Venezuelan political prisoners were imprisoned solely for opposing Maduro, whose re-election is widely disputed. The Venezuelan government denies having any political prisoners, a claim rejected by rights groups.
In a post on X, Bukele suggested a humanitarian agreement for the repatriation of all 252 Venezuelans deported by the US in exchange for the release of the same number of political prisoners held by Venezuela. He also mentioned nearly 50 prisoners of other nationalities, including US citizens, as part of the proposed swap. The Venezuelan government has not publicly responded to Bukele’s offer.
In recent weeks, over 200 Venezuelans were deported from the US to El Salvador. The Trump administration accuses them of being members of the Tren de Aragua criminal gang. Washington pays El Salvador to detain these deportees in the notorious high-security Terrorism Confinement Center. Under Trump’s hard-line immigration policies, various legal hurdles have emerged. The US Supreme Court recently ordered a halt to the deportation of another group of alleged Venezuelan gang members. Challenges to mass deportations have been labeled as “meritless litigation” by the White House. The Trump administration is detaining and deporting accused Venezuelan gang members using the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which allows the president to do so without regular legal processes, a power previously used only during wartime.
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn5xl5ppzr2o
