(CNN Spanish) — Italian citizen Juan Carlos Marrufo has been on a hunger strike since Saturday in protest at the conditions he considers to be in violation of his human rights in the basement of the Military Counterintelligence Directorate in Caracas, where he is being held together with his wife, the Spanish Venezuelan María Auxiliadora Delgado, reported Lucila Hurtado, the couple’s lawyer.
Hurtado pointed out that the protest points against the procedural delay, the overcrowding conditions and the lack of health care. The lawyer pointed out that Delgado has suffered two hypertensive crises in recent months and that Marrufo, in addition to presenting hypertension, suffers from his spine and sometimes has difficulty getting up. She assures the defense that these ailments have not been properly treated.
Juan Carlos Marrufo and his wife María Auxiliadora Delgado. Credit: Family Courtesy
CNN contacted the Venezuelan Attorney General’s Office to find out its reaction to these complaints, but so far we have not received a response. Efforts have also been made to obtain comments from the Military Counterintelligence Directorate, without success so far.
Marrufo and Delgado were detained by military counterintelligence agents on March 19, 2019 in Valencia, the capital of Carabobo state. They are accused of the crimes of terrorism, criminal association and treason related to the events recorded on August 4, 2018, when the questioned government of Nicolás Maduro denounced an attempted assassination through the use of drones during a civic parade. -military.
The trial against them is still in progress and, according to their lawyer, no new hearings have been scheduled since January 19.
The defense argues that the accusation lacks evidence that links the couple to the events recorded that day in 2018 on Bolívar Avenue in Caracas. Relatives of Marrufo and Delgado point out that the case responds to the persecution against the brother of María Auxiliadora Delgado, Osman Alexis Delgado Tabosky, who was accused by the Maduro government of financing the drone attack and the assault on the Paramacay fort that occurred on 6 August 2017.
In January 2022, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention called for the couple’s release.