Sheltered Venezuelan government opponents decry police and intelligence agents outside embassy

CARACAS (AP) — Six Venezuelan government opponents who have sheltered for months at the Argentine embassy in Caracas decried Sunday that local police and intelligence agents were stationed outside of it for hours.

The move prompted the U.S. government to call it a serious violation of international law and Argentina’s Foreign Ministry to describe it as an act of harassment.

Most of the opponents belong to the Vente Venezuela party led by former legislator María Corina Machado. It denounced what it called “a new siege by hooded officials” that began Saturday night and extended into Sunday.

The incident occurred hours after Machado called for a massive mobilization on Dec. 1, prompting Venezuela’s minister of the interior to accuse the political leader of being part of a new conspiracy attempt against the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

Vente Venezuela said in a statement that the diplomatic headquarters remains without electricity and is surrounded by “regime vehicles” that are preventing traffic from circulating in the area. It said communication signals also were scrambled.

Argentina’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement late Saturday that the deployment of armed troops and the closing of streets in the vicinity “constitute a disturbance of security.”. It also called on the international community to condemn the incident, which the U.S. did.

On Sunday, the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela posted on X that the U.S. “strongly condemns the acts of harassment against asylum seekers.”

“The deployment of armed forces and blockades seriously violate international law,” it said. “We demand that the Venezuelan regime respect its international obligations, cease these intimidating actions and guarantee safe passage for asylum seekers.”

Diplomatic relations between the two countries have been broken since 2019.

The opposition members entered the embassy in March after the Venezuelan Attorney General’s Office issued arrest warrants and accused them of promoting alleged acts of violence to destabilize the government.

In August, Brazil accepted Argentina’s request to guard its embassy after the Venezuelan government ordered the expulsion of Argentine diplomatic personnel following statements by its president, Javier Milei, that he would not recognize “another fraud” in Venezuela after the controversial elections in Jul y.

A month later, Venezuela revoked Brazil’s authorization to guard the embassy, alleging it had evidence of the use of the facilities “for the planning of terrorist activities and assassination attempts.”

Brazil and Argentina have rejected those accusations.