Venezuelan archbishop’s passport seized as Machado wins Nobel

Venezuela detained its top Catholic leader and confiscated his passport just as opposition figure María Corina Machado drew international attention for receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.

Catholic Archbishop Baltazar Porras was held for several hours at Maiquetia airport in Caracas on Wednesday while attempting to fly to Colombia en route to Spain, according to Provea, a local human rights group. He was later released, but airport officials kept his passport.

The move adds to rising tension between President Nicolás Maduro’s government and the Catholic church, which counts a majority of Venezuelans among its members. The late Hugo Chávez frequently clashed with church leaders, once calling the institution a “tumor” and describing its representatives as “devils under cassocks” as criticism mounted over his policies and repression.

“This act of harassment is not isolated and is part of a policy to silence anyone perceived as an opponent,” said Laura Dib, Venezuela program director at the Washington Office of Latin America. “Maduro’s authoritarian government persecutes critical voices such as Porras even in the light of the Church’s critical stand on Trump’s actions in the Caribbean,” she added, referring to US military strikes on alleged drug trafficking vessels.

The incident occurred the same day opposition leader and Maduro rival Machado was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo in recognition of her struggle for democracy and freedom. Machado left Venezuela but was delayed by bad weather, so her daughter accepted the award on her behalf.

Under Maduro, relations with the church have shifted between brief attempts at dialogue and recurring confrontation. Even after a 2021 “reconciliation” meeting, Maduro went on to label Porras a “conspirator” after the archbishop denounced Venezuelan corruption, institutional interference and rights abuses in Rome, and criticized torture cases under the government.

Provea said the withholding or invalidation of identity documents is part of a broader pattern of rights violations that has intensified since last year’s presidential election.