Paris, Caracas, 10 May 2025. According to witnesses, the human rights defender, lawyer, and member of PROVEA’s legal enforcement team, was last seen on Friday, 9 May, at 4pm in Parque Central, Caracas, after attending a meeting. His relatives communicated with him at the same time, during which the activist reported that he was heading to his home near Av. Fuerzas Armadas, but he never arrived.
His wife, Emiselys Nuñez, accompanied by members of PROVEA, is visiting different detention centers in Caracas in search of information about the whereabouts of Eduardo Torres, who has repeatedly been the target of threats and harassment by police officials of the Venezuelan state.
FIDH - of which PROVEA is a member organisation - is deeply concerned over the high probability that Eduardo Torres is being subjected to detention and enforced disappearance due to his work as a human rights activist and the persistent threats against him.
It must be remembered that, against the backdrop of a post-election crackdown, Venezuelan authorities have ramped up attacks and persecution targeting human rights activists, as well as social and political leaders, seeking to suppress peaceful dissent and citizen-led demands.
It must also be emphasised that Eduardo Torres, like the rest of PROVEA’s team, is a beneficiary of precautionary protection measures granted by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) due to the repeated threats, criminalisation, and harassment against his work in Venezuela.
If Eduardo Torres is being arbitrarily detained, we demand his immediate release.