US urges Venezuela to free opposition figures as Maduro says he must win reelection to avoid a ‘bloodbath’

By Mauricio Torres and Sahar Akbarzai, CNN

(CNN) — The United States has raised concerns about the recent arrests of Venezuelan democratic opposition figures ahead of the country’s elections this month, as authoritarian President Nicolas Maduro told his supporters he must win at the polls to avoid a possible “bloodbath.”

“If they do not want Venezuela to fall into a bloodbath, into a fratricidal civil war,” the ruling party must win the presidential elections on July 28, Maduro told a campaign event in Caracas on Tuesday.

Only a win for his party would ensure “peace” in the country, Maduro said, adding that he expects “irreversible results” in his favor.

CNN has reached out to Maduro’s office for further comment on his statements.

Maduro’s remarks come as his government attempts to cling on to power for another six years while facing a credible challenge from opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia. Many experts believe the opposition has a real chance of pushing Maduro out of office.

In the run up to the vote, Venezuela has “unjustly detained” democratic opposition figures, civil society members and journalists, according to the US State Department, which called for their release in a statement Wednesday.

Strongman Maduro has been in power in for more than a decade, having assumed the presidency following the death of predecessor Hugo Chavez in 2013, during which time his government has often been accused of rigging votes and silencing the opposition.

The 2018 election that returned Maduro to office was largely boycotted by the opposition. The poll was described as illegitimate by an alliance of 14 Latin American nations, Canada and the United States and as a “farce” by the Organization of American States.

There were hopes the 2024 election might be different after Maduro promised Washington last year in a historic agreement that he would hold free and fair elections in exchange for sanctions relief.

However, more recently the opposition has accused him of reneging on that pledge. Two opposition candidates – Maria Corina Machado and Corina Yoris – have been barred from running while a report this week by a human rights group suggested there had been a spate of “arbitrary detentions” since the beginning of the campaign season on July 4.

Human rights NGO Laboratorio de Paz reported Monday there had been 71 arbitrary detentions in the first 10 days of campaigning, the majority of them involving people who had provided some type of service to the campaign command of the opposition candidate González, of the Democratic Unitary Platform.

Two days after Laboratorio’s report came out, the barred opposition leader Machado said in a post on X that her security chief had also been arrested.

Machado said her security chief Milciades Ávila was “kidnapped” on Wednesday “by the Maduro regime and accused of gender violence against some women.”

The opposition leader said the women who accuse Ávila of gender violence tried to “attack” her and González Urrutia in a restaurant last Saturday.

“There are dozens of witnesses and videos that demonstrate that this was a planned provocation to leave us without protection 11 days before July 28,” Machado wrote.

CNN has reached out to Venezuela’s Attorney General’s Office for comment on Ávila’s arrest and to determine whether he has legal representation.

The US was concerned about Ávila’s arrest and called for his immediate release, a State Department spokesperson said Wednesday. The US also urged Venezuela to release all those who were “unjustly detained” during the presidential election campaign.

Costa Rica, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic and Panama meanwhile called on Venezuelan authorities to guarantee that elections are “free, fair, and transparent,” in a joint statement released Wednesday by the Alliance for Development in Democracy.

CNN has asked the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry for a response to the joint statement.

Maduro is one of 10 candidates vying for the presidency, however, several of them have minimal support and are viewed by the main opposition as government allies.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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