Caracas (AFP) – Leading Venezuelan opposition politician Juan Pablo Guanipa was arrested Friday on charges of conspiring to sabotage upcoming parliamentary and regional elections that the opposition has vowed to boycott.
The arrest of Guanipa, a 60-year-old former MP and close ally of opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, comes amid rising tensions ahead of Sunday's election.
Machado has called on voters to spurn the ballot, which comes 10 months after elections that leftist President Nicolas Maduro is widely accused of stealing.
Guanipa, like Machado, went into hiding after the July 2024 presidential vote, which the opposition and much of the international community believes opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia rightfully won.
Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello linked Guanipa's arrest to what the government called a foiled plot by foreign mercenaries to sabotage Sunday's vote for members of parliament and 24 state governors.
"He is one of the leaders of this terrorist network," Cabello said on state television, adding that the plan to disrupt the vote was detailed on four telephones and a laptop found in Guanipa's possession.
The suspects planned to plant bombs in hospitals, metro stations, police stations and power plants, Cabello said, adding that authorities had seized explosives, weapons, detonators and cash.
He added that 70 other people had also been arrested in connection with the alleged plot, including citizens of Ecuador, Argentina, Germany, Serbia and "a few" Pakistani nationals.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a statement expressing "concern following the unjustified and arbitrary arrest of opposition leader Juan Pablo Guanipa and over 70 individuals" in what he labeled a "new wave of repression from the Maduro regime."
A message on Guanipa's X account, shortly after his arrest, read: "If you are reading this, it is because I have been kidnapped by the forces of Nicolas Maduro's regime."
"I am not sure what will happen to me in the coming hours, days and weeks. But what I am sure of is that we will win the long fight against the dictatorship."
Machado accused Maduro of "STATE TERRORISM, pure and simple," saying Guanipa was "an example for all citizens and political leaders, inside and outside Venezuela."
Maduro has presided over the collapse of oil-rich Venezuela's economy over his past 12 years of increasingly repressive rule.
Millions of people have fled the country, mostly to other Latin American countries.
In July, Maduro claimed to have won a third term, without producing detailed results to back his claim.
The opposition published its own tally of results, which showed a convincing win for Gonzalez Urrutia.
The state prosecutor's office on Friday accused Guanipa of having been part of a "criminal organization" that attempted to sabotage that election, as well as this weekend's vote.
Maduro, a former bus driver who was handpicked by late firebrand socialist leader Hugo Chavez to succeed him in 2013, frequently claims to be the target of US- and Colombian-backed coup plots.
Mass arrests of government critics have become routine.
The government on Monday suspended flights from Colombia after arresting dozens of people it said were mercenaries that had slipped into Venezuela from its neighbor.
A trained lawyer, Guanipa was named vice president in the now-defunct parallel government established by former opposition leader Juan Guaido after 2018 presidential elections which returned Maduro for a second term.
The opposition boycotted those elections after its most popular candidates were barred from running.