Published February 4, 2026
Thousands of people marched through Venezuela’s capital Caracas demanding the release of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Syria Flores, exactly one month after a bloody nighttime raid by U.S. forces.
“Venezuela needs Nicolás!” chanted the crowd at Tuesday’s demonstration, dubbed “Gran Marcha” (Grand March).
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Thousands carried placards supporting the abducted president, many wearing shirts calling for the couple’s return from detention in U.S. prisons.
“The Empire kidnapped them. We want them back,” one banner held by marchers declared.
Nicolás Maduro Guerra, son of the detained president and a member of the Venezuelan National Assembly, addressed the crowd from the podium, saying his father’s abduction by U.S. forces on January 3 “will forever remain like a scar on our faces.”
“The soil of our homeland was desecrated by foreign forces,” Maduro Guerra said of the night his father was abducted by U.S. forces.
The march, which was called for by the government and was attended by many public sector workers, stretched for several hundred meters and was accompanied by trucks blaring music.
Local media outlet Venezuela News reported that the march was part of a “global day of action” calling for the couple’s release. Protesters demonstrated under banners with slogans such as “Take them back” and “Hands off Venezuela” in a show of solidarity around the world.
The international event united voices from “different ideological leanings” and agreed that “the detention of President Maduro and Syria Flores is a grave violation of international law and a dangerous precedent for national sovereignty,” the news agency said.
Jose Perdomo, 58, a city worker who marched in Caracas, said: “We are confused, sad and angry. We have a lot of different emotions.”
“Sooner or later they will have to release our president,” he said, adding that he also supports Venezuela’s interim leader Delcy Rodriguez.
Since taking over as acting president, Rodriguez has walked a fine line between appeasing Maduro’s supporters in the government and meeting demands placed on Caracas by President Donald Trump.
President Trump has said he is willing to work with Rodriguez as long as Caracas is consistent with his demands, especially that the United States take control of Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
Rodriguez has struck a conciliatory tone with Washington, promising reforms and reconciliation at home and has already released hundreds of political prisoners and opened Venezuela’s nationalized hydrocarbon sector to private investment.
Hundreds of university students and relatives of political prisoners also marched in the capital early Tuesday to demand early approval of an amnesty law promised by Rodriguez to free prisoners from the country’s prisons.
No amnesty bill has yet been submitted to Congress.
