Venezuela: RSF condemns the enforced disappearance of Rory Branker and demands the release of all six detained news professionals

A contributor to the digital outlet La Patilla, Rory Branker, 43, was arrestedon 20 February 2025 in Caracas by officers of the Bolivarian Intelligence Service (SEBIN) as he was leaving his home. He spent 206 days incommunicado before his family was finally allowed to see him in a holding cellof the Bolivarian National Police, in September. After the visit, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) granted the journalist precautionary measures- meaning the IACHR sent an urgent request to the state of Venezuela to protect Branker's rights to "life and personal integrity" - after determining the serious risk to his life and physical integrity and the lack of official information about his condition.

Despite the IACHR's request to the Venezuelan state, the country's authorities once again moved him to an unknown location on 8 December, according to RSF information. In addition, a videoby photojournalist Jesús Medina published on the Instagram account of the digital news outlet VPI TV on 9 December shows Rory Branker among a group of detainees being loaded into an official vehicle. It has been over a week and the state has still not specified where the journalist was taken or under what conditions he is being held. The shocking lack of information has plunged his family into a state of extreme stress, particularly his elderly mother, who suffers from serious health problems.

The arbitrary transfer of Rory Branker occurred shortly after the death in custody of opposition leader and former governor of Nueva Esparta, Alfredo Díaz, who diedon 6 December at the El Helicoide detention centre in Caracas, amid allegations of denial of adequate medical care. Human rights organisations have documented that, following this death, authorities ordered the partial evacuationof El Helicoide and other detention facilities. Groups of political prisoners were dispersed to various prisons across the country, without judicial oversight or notification to their families.

Persecution, enforced disappearances and arbitrary detention: a Venezuelan pattern of press repression

At present, six Venezuelan news professionals have been deprived of their liberty for reasons directly linked to their journalistic work. The other five are:

• Leandro Palmar: contributor to LUZ Radio 102.9 FMand the digital outlet Venezuela es Noticia, and his producer, Belices Salvador Cubillán, arrestedon 9 January 2025 in Maracaibo while covering protests and transferred on 1 November to the Aragua Penitentiary Centre (Tocorón).

• Nakary Mena Ramos, reporter for the independent news portal Impacto Venezuela, detainedon 8 April 2025 after publishing an investigative report on insecurity in Caracas. She is currently held at the National Institute for Female Orientation (INOF) and is the only woman journalist currently behind bars in the country.

• Gianni González, cameraman for Impacto Venezuelaand husband of Nakary Mena Ramos, detained at El Rodeo prison.

• Luis López,correspondent for La Verdad de Vargas, detainedat El Helicoide detention centre since June 2024 - over seventeen months ago.

According to our analysis, Rory Branker's case fits a clear pattern: in Venezuela, arbitrary arrests are often followed by transfers to undisclosed locations and prolonged periods of incommunicado detention. On 3 November, RSF condemnedthe enforced disappearance of journalist and university lecturer Joan Camargo, university professor and journalist dedicated to covering police news for independent media outlets, who was abducted by hooded men on 30 October in Cotiza, a neighbourhood of the capital Caracas. After more than five days of being missing, Joan Camargo was released thanks to sustained pressure on the authorities from his family, the National Union of Press Workers (SNTP) and international organisations.

The repeated use of this strategy - now aggravated by the opaque transfer of Rory Branker - demonstrates that short- and medium-term enforced disappearances have become an established tactic to facilitate the crackdown on Venezuela's free press. In many of these cases, authorities have relied on criminal charges such as "terrorism," "conspiracy," "incitement to hatred" and "the dissemination of false information," based on the Organic Law against Organised Crime and Terrorist Financing and the so-called Law against Hatred, texts adopted by a Constituent National Assembly lacking legislative authority.

These legal instruments are routinely used to persecute news coverage, critical opinions and reporting on crime or protests in a country where press freedom continues to be systematically undermined.