Meda remembers the last sunrise she enjoyed outside the embassy.
She had woken early to attend meetings with opposition leader Maria Corina Machado to discuss the Venezuelan government’s escalating persecution — and decide who would represent the coalition in the upcoming presidential election.
The government had already banned Machado from running, despite her landslide victory in the opposition’s primary.
Then, news arrived that changed everything. Venezuela’s Attorney General Tarek William Saab had appeared on television to announce arrest warrants for a string of opposition members — and Meda’s name was on the list.
“We had to run, hide and take shelter. It was a brutal situation,” said Meda, who was Machado’s campaign manager during the election. She spoke to Al Jazeera through written correspondences sent electronically.
“I will never forget that call to my husband to give him the news,” she added.
Two of her colleagues had already been detained that day. In a viral video, Dignora Hernandez, the opposition’s political secretary, could be seen screaming for help as agents bundled her into a silver vehicle.
Meda and the others had to act fast. In the past, opposition members had sought refuge within the confines of embassies, taking advantage of an international treaty — the 1954 Caracas Convention — that allows diplomatic missions in Latin America to grant asylum to individuals facing political persecution.
Additionally, the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations prevents the host country’s authorities from entering the premises without prior permission.
In Meda’s case, it would be the Argentine embassy that would provide the crucial refuge. Its government had long been critical of reported human rights abuses under Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, and it offered Meda and five others asylum in the embassy residence.
At first, Meda and her colleagues not only found physical safety within the embassy walls but also a space to continue their work on the presidential campaign before the 2024 election.
But a year on, the group’s situation has become more precarious — and Maduro is still in power.
After the July 28 vote, Maduro claimed victory, despite published voting tallies that indicate he was trounced by the opposition candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez.
In December, the United Nations Human Rights Committee opened an investigation to analyse evidence that the vote was rigged. It ordered the Maduro government to refrain from destroying any election tallies while the probe is ongoing.
After Argentina refused to recognise Maduro’s contested election victory, its diplomats were expelled. Argentina transferred control of the embassy to Brazil, but the diplomats of that country have been unable to enter the premises, blocked by local authorities.
Today, five opposition members remain alone inside the empty embassy.
Venezuelan intelligence and armed forces are stationed on the street outside. Security officials have seized nearby homes, and those inside the embassy say the state electricity company came to take the fuses from the electricity box, leaving them with only a generator for power.
Human rights groups have condemned Venezuela for violating international rules on asylum, including the right to safe passage.
Carolina Jimenez Sandoval, president of the Washington Office on Latin America, an advocacy group based in the United States, described the situation as a “siege”.
“One purpose is to break them psychologically — to make them feel that it is better for them to leave the embassy and then let the Venezuelan security forces detain them,” Jimenez explained.
“By keeping the building or the diplomatic mission under constant siege and cutting electricity and water, the Venezuelan government shows how willing it is to break international rules to achieve its own purpose.”
