Nahuel Gallo, the Argentine Board Guard officer who was freed this week after 448 days in a Venezuelan prison said on Wednesday that he had been held in a facility of “psychological torture.”
The officer in Argentina’s Gendarmería Nacional was held at the feared Rodeo I prison on the outskirts of Caracas until last weekend, when he was freed after negotiations that involved the Argentine Football Association (AFA).
“Rodeo I is not a very good place – it is a place of significant psychological torture that is not pleasant to recount,” Galoo told journalists at a press conference staged at the headquarters of the Gendarmería in Buenos Aires.
Gallo, 33, said he would continue to feel “imprisoned” until the remaining foreign detainees held in Venezuela are released.
Wearing a uniform bearing his name, which hung loosely off his frame after more than a year in captivity, Gallo called for the release of 24 other foreign prisoners held at the same centre.
“We had no visits, we had no phone calls,” he said before breaking down in tears, as National Security Minister Alejandra Monteoliva took his hand.
“I do not want to recount the atrocities they committed, I cannot,” he continued.
Gallo urged NGOs not to “lower their arms” and to keep pressuring the Venezuelan government: “This is not finished. I am still locked up. Until they release those 24 foreigners, I will not be free.”
AFA President Claudio ‘Chiqui’ Tapia said in a post on social media over the weekend that the release was made possible by joint work between the Venezuelan Football Federation and the CONMEBOL regional federation.
That came as something of an embarrassment to President Javier Milei’s government, which has been pushing for Gallo’s release for months.
The incident occurred amid a conflict between Argentina’s government and AFA, the body that governs football in Argentina.
Gallo, who arrived in Argentina on Monday morning, was summoned to testify as a witness in a universal jurisdiction case by local court probing crimes against humanity by Venezuela’s deposed president, Nicolás Maduro.
Venezuela’s interim leader Delcy Rodríguez has initiated a programme of political prisoner releases and a general amnesty after the capture of Maduro in a US military operation. She has also improved ties with Washington.
Since the start of the releases on 8 January, more than 540 people have been freed, but around 560 – including dozens of foreigners – remain in prison for political reasons, according to figures from the Venezuela-based Foro Penal NGO.
– TIMES/AFP/PERFIL
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