VENEZUELA: 4 COLOMBIANS RELEASED AFTER ARBITRARY DETENTION

The International League Against Arbitrary Detention (ILAAD) welcomes the release of David Josué Misse Durán, Brayan Sair Navarro Cáceres, Edwin Iván Colmenares García, and Kevin José Saavedra Basallo, Colombian nationals who had been arbitrarily detained in Venezuela for a few months to a year.

• In response, ILAAD, alongside JusticeXLivertad, submitted a complaint to the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) and to the United Nations Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearance (WGEID), calling for their immediate release, reparations, and an independent investigation into the arbitrary and discriminatory nature of their detention.

• The Colombian authorities closely followed the cases, engaging in sustained diplomatic efforts with the Venezuelan Government.

On 24 October 2025, they were released, with 13 other Colombians, from several prisons, at the border in Táchira state, with diplomatic officials from both countries present.

While celebrating this long-awaited release, ILAAD stresses that arbitrary detention must never be used as a political tool.

In its 2020 Annual report (A/HRC/48/55) and in the light of the adoption of the Declaration against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations, on 15 February 2021, in Ottawa, the Working Group recalled its grave concern about the detention of foreign nationals especially in instances where foreign nationals are detained in a country in order to gain leverage in relations with the States of their nationality, and its recommendations for the proper and prompt consular assistance as an essential safeguard against arbitrary detention.

In the case at hand it is respectfully submitted that the Working Group finds as well that David Josué Misse Durán, Brayan Sair Navarro Cáceres, Edwin Iván Colmenares García, and Kevin José Saavedra Basallo has been deprived of their liberty on discriminatory grounds because of their status as a foreign national to use them as bargaining chips in State-to-State relations in violation of articles 2 and 7 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and articles 2 and 26 of the Covenant (Category V).