UPDATED April 27 at 9 pm
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro calls his country’s tens of thousands of anti-government protesters “terrorists.” But the son of one high-ranking Maduro official is publicly telling the regime it’s wrong.
Yibram Saab is a Venezuelan law student – and the son of Tarek Saab, Venezuela’s human rights ombudsman. In Venezuela the human rights ombudsman is pretty much there to tell the authoritarian socialist government that its human rights performance is just fine.
But in a video released Wednesday night, Yibram Saab tells his father that’s simply not true.
The Venezuelan government has locked up more than 100 political prisoners. This month its security forces and paramilitary goons have repeatedly attacked Venezuelans protesting the regime and the country’s economic collapse. At least 29 people have been killed in the unrest.
In the video, Yibram Saab urges his father: “Papá, in this moment you have the power to end the injustice that has sunk this country.” He goes on to say: “I ask you as your son, and in the name of Venezuela…do the right thing.”
Thursday night Tarek Saab said he loved his son, but disagreed with him. President Maduro’s son, Nicolás Maduro Guerra, refuted the video on Twitter.
