Kidnapping and murder of Venezuelan military officer demeans Chile’s sovereignty and questions President Boric

(Interamerican Institute for Democracy) An individual who was politically persecuted by Venezuela’s dictatorship and had gotten asylum in Chile, was kidnapped, and assassinated by an armed group that forcibly removed him from his house in Santiago. The victim’s background and the nature of the dictatorship that wields power in Venezuela compels us to consider this case as an act of “the extraterritorial application of State-terrorism” that 21st Century Socialism practices and that demeans Chile’s sovereignty and questions President Boric.

Information from the news media reveals that 32-year-old Ronald Ojeda, a Venezuelan citizen, and an officer of Venezuela’s Army, was a political prisoner, part recipient of the Sakharov Award in 2017, was tortured, demoted, and expelled from the armed forces by Venezuela’s dictatorship, and had fled from the Ramo Verde prison and was granted political asylum in Chile. Ojeda, married and the father of a four-year-old boy, on “Wednesday, 21st of February was kidnapped from his house in the commune of Independencia, in Santiago, by four armed subjects with Caribbean accent.” Over a week later “his body was found in a concrete structure, inside of a suitcase, in an irregular camp of the Maipu commune” in the city of Santiago.

On the 18th of January of 2024, the governments from Chile and Venezuela represented by Manuel Monsalve, Undersecretary of the Interior from Chile, and Jose Humberto Ramirez Marque, Vice-Minister of Venezuela’s Integrated System of Criminal Investigations, subscribed an accord titled “Agreement in Matters of Police Cooperation, Between the Ministry of the Interior and Public Security of the Republic of Chile, and the Ministry of Popular Power for Internal Affairs, Justice, and Peace from the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.”

This “Cooperation Agreement” was signed between Chile, a country with democracy, and Venezuela, a dictatorship, stating as its objective the “cooperation in order to facilitate the flow of information in the area of their respective national jurisdictions” and indicating as “actions to be accomplished” to “conduct actions aimed at the collaboration and exchange of information regarding violent crimes…” The content of the agreement, far from benefitting Chile’s security, clearly places Chile in the orbit of Para-Dictatorial governments, that is; of “democratic governments at the service of Castrochavism dictatorships.” The incongruence of the agreement is noteworthy.

We assume the location, kidnapping, and assassination of Ronald Ojeda do not have anything to do with the existing “Cooperation Agreement” between the governments of President Gabriel Boric and dictator Nicolas Maduro, none the less, its existence and scope is a written threat against all Venezuelans who are politically persecuted, and all refugees, and asylees in Chilean territory.

Following the kidnapping of Ojeda, the government of President Boris stated that “no hypothesis is being ruled out” and that it was pursuing “three courses of investigation: A possible kidnapping by agents from the feared Venezuelan General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence, a self-kidnapping to erase any trace of Ojeda’s existence to Maduro’s regime, and a simple extortive kidnapping carried out by organized crime…” With the ascertainment of the assassination, Boric’s Minister of the Interior expressed “condolences to his family and relatives” and added “we will continue supporting the investigation that Chile’s Attorney General is conducting so that this crime can be completely clarified and the culprits be punished with the utmost harshness.”

It all points to the fact that the government of Chile pretends to handle this matter as a common crime, but given the objective reality of its transnational political nature and the features of a crime against humanity (Statute of Rome, Article 7.1.h, i, k). The condition of the victim, the circumstances of his presence in Chile, the nature of Venezuela’s dictatorship, the images of the “kidnapping operation” with apparent supplantation of authority recorded by video cameras of the building where the kidnapping and assassination took place, do not allow President Boric and his government to pretend to distance themselves from this case.

This is a matter of global interest, a matter that demeans Chile’s sovereignty as an independent and democratic State because its power and authority have been violated in its own territory. The fall-out of the kidnapping and assassination of Ronald Ojeda urge an in-depth investigation of the execution of State-terrorism by Venezuela’s dictatorship in Chilean territory. Besides the wielder of power that subjects the Venezuelan peoples, who has a vested interest in this type of crimes? State-terrorism is executed to instill fear and this has instilled such fear in Chilean territory with an impact in Venezuela, the Americas, and the world.

A person, such as Gabriel Boric, with an evident position regarding the identification of human rights’ violations, is now questioned for his silence in dealing with these crimes that have been committed under his jurisdiction and cannot be covered up under his authority.

*Attorney & Political Scientist. Director of the Interamerican Institute for Democracy.

Translation from Spanish by Edgar L. Terrazas