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A Tribute That Pierces Walls

  • Luz Neira Parra

In the capital of the United States, in the solemn halls of Georgetown University, a moment unfolded that cracked the silence. With the presence of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, the university—through its Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security—honored Venezuelan women imprisoned for political reasons, under the banner “Courageous Venezuelan Women Political Prisoners.”

This was not a ceremonial gesture, but an ethical declaration. In a country like the U.S., where universities themselves battle for truth and academic freedom, Georgetown’s act reads as a moral and political intervention: to recognize women jailed for defending human rights in Venezuela is, simultaneously, to denounce a regime that has made fear into statecraft.

Venezuela is not a nation weary. It is a nation that waits and insists, that demands. A country that spoke in 2024, when it chose—through votes and conscience—to reaffirm its faith in democratic change. That Venezuela watches quietly, even as women remain locked up for the “crime” of raising their voice, defending others, or simply fulfilling their duties.

This recognition by Georgetown and by Secretary Clinton restores a portion of the humanity stripped from these women. It lifts them from the anonymity the regime intended for them, turning them into visible symbols of resistance. Behind each cell stands a story the world must acknowledge: a woman torn from her family, silenced, accused, tortured, degraded—solely for exercising citizenship.

Among the names that chart this collective tragedy are Rocío San Miguel, detained on February 9, 2024 alongside her daughter at Maiquetía Airport, accused without evidence and kept in strict isolation; Maykelis Borges, arrested on January 29, 2025 while just two months pregnant; María Oropeza, seized on August 6, 2024 and confined in El Helicoide under conditions widely denounced as torturous; Martha Lía Grajales, a human rights defender detained on August 8, 2025 under arbitrary accusations; Emirlendris Benítez, arrested in 2018, subjected to repeated torture, transfers, and sentenced without due process; and detainees such as Araminta González, Gina Mercado, Ivonne Barrios, Karen Palacios, María Lourdes Afiuni, and Nakary Ramos, whose names appear in records of Venezuela’s largest all-female prison, Instituto Nacional de Orientación Femenina (INOF), and reports of cruel or degrading treatment.

Each name tells a story of perseverance in the face of state violence. These are women enduring interrogations, isolation, hunger, illness, and imposed silence.

Yet this tribute also embraces those not behind bars, who suffer the prison of absence: wives waiting for a call from a cell, mothers aging without embracing their children, daughters raised with a portrait instead of a father, grandmothers who won’t know their grandchildren because their children left seeking livelihood abroad. This network of women—imprisoned or free, yet equally harmed by repression, exile, or poverty—sustains a country through quiet strength. While headlines speak of sanctions or elections, these women work, teach, pray, raise children, and keep alive the memory of their loved ones. Their daily courage is political resistance.

The fact that it was a university that raised its voice—not a parliament, a court, or a government—carries a double meaning. The university, located in the United States, with Secretary Clinton as witness, emphasized a vital truth: defending women’s rights is borderless. As a Venezuelan academic, this gesture resonates with me deeply. I feel pride and joy knowing that it was precisely a university that broke the silence, that lent its voice to those who cannot speak, that converted knowledge into conscience and conscience into action. In an era where critique is punished, the university proved it can still be a sanctuary for truth and freedom.

This recognition cannot end in ceremony. It must convert into diplomatic pressure, international monitoring, sustained visibility—and above all, a bold demand: freedom for every woman imprisoned for political reasons in Venezuela.

This tribute seeks not pity, but justice. And justice here means release, protection, and redress. While the regime multiplies its shadows, a foreign university lit a flame. That flame now belongs to all: women behind walls, those waiting outside, those who left, and those who still dream of return.

Venezuela is not exhausted. Venezuela stands impatient, vigilant, demanding. Each woman—prisoner, exile, grandmother, mother, daughter—is part of a nation that refuses to yield.

The applause in Washington crossed a continent. Now that recognition unites with another luminous symbol: the Nobel Prize awarded to María Corina Machado, the woman who embodies the voice of Venezuelan women. Her democratic fight, her resistance without hatred, and her unwavering resolve in the face of repression represent the same cause universities and free peoples have just honored: female dignity that never surrenders.

In María Corina lies the echo of thousands of silenced voices, the imprisoned, the exiled, the waiting, the hopeful. This tribute—together with the historic Nobel prize—reminds us that the Venezuelan woman—from INOF’s cells to freedom’s plazas—is still the bravest face of a nation refusing to die.

Luz Neira Parra is a Venezuelan journalist and university professor with over twenty-five years of experience in media and education. She directed Aventura Televisión in Maracaibo before moving to the United States, where she continues to write about democracy, human rights, and Latin American culture.

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