Víctor Martínez
Víctor Martínez is a human rights defender who collaborates with the Comité de Víctimas contra la Impunidad del estado de Lara – COVICIL (Committee of Victims Against Impunity in the state of Lara) and has regularly appeared on radio and television programmes denouncing police and military involvement in human rights violations, including extortion, kidnapping and trafficking of narcotics, as well as the presence of death squads in the state. He is also a former Deputy of the Legislative Assembly of the state of Lara.
HRDs have been working under restrictive policies for many years: the Maduro administration has continued the work begun by Chávez in restricting civil space and delegitimising HRDs, repeatedly accusing them of undermining the Venezuelan democracy with the alleged collaboration of the United States. HRDs are discredited and criminalised by state-controlled media (television, radio, print media) on a weekly basis.
