Venezuela has released 10 imprisoned Americans in exchange for the return home of about 250 Venezuelan migrants deported from the United States to El Salvador months ago as part of the Trump administration's immigration measures, the Associated Press reported, quoted by BTA.
The agency notes that this is a diplomatic achievement for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, helps President Donald Trump bring home Americans imprisoned abroad, and also benefits El Salvador, which proposed the exchange scheme in question months ago.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio thanked Trump and El Salvador President Nayib Bukele for reaching the agreement. "Ten Americans who were detained in Venezuela are on their way to freedom," he wrote on the social network "Ex".
In a post on "Ex", Bukele said those released in Venezuela were on their way to El Salvador, from where they would continue their "journey home", Reuters reported.
The Venezuelan government confirmed that 252 Venezuelans detained in El Salvador had been released, describing the Salvadoran prison where they were being held as a "concentration camp".
El Salvador will return Venezuelan migrants after the Trump administration agreed to pay $6 million to house them in a notorious Salvadoran prison. The agreement caused an immediate stir when Trump invoked an 18th-century wartime law to quickly relocate individuals his administration accuses of being members of criminal gangs.
The Venezuelans are being held in a massive prison known as the Terrorist Detention Center, which was built to house detainees during the Salvadoran president's war on the country's criminal gangs. Human rights activists have documented hundreds of deaths and cases of torture within its walls. The AP notes that the release of the Venezuelans is seen as a victory for Maduro, who, after years of accusations of human rights abuses, has for months used the detention of his compatriots in El Salvador to level similar criticisms at the United States, forcing even some of his most outspoken political opponents to agree with his condemnation of the treatment of migrants. The return of the migrants would allow Maduro to demonstrate that even if the Trump administration and other countries do not officially recognize him as the legitimate president, he still holds power in practice. In the second half of 2024 Venezuelan authorities have detained about a dozen American citizens on charges of participating in plots to destabilize the country.