Opposition leader María Corina Machado said Thursday that she doesn't believe the Venezuelan government knew where she was hiding for most of this year, as she met Norway's leader a day after her daughter received the Nobel Peace Prize on her behalf.
Machado arrived in Oslo hours after Wednesday's prize ceremony and made her first public appearance in 11 months in the early hours of Thursday, emerging from a hotel balcony and waving to an emotional crowd of supporters. She had been in hiding since Jan. 9, when she was briefly detained after joining supporters in a protest in Caracas, The Associated Press said.
Machado was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in October after mounting the most serious peaceful challenge in years to the authoritarian government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Her daughter, Ana Corina Sosa, accepted the prize in Oslo and said that Machado "will be back in Venezuela very soon.”
On Thursday morning, Machado was received by Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store, who said his country is ready to support a democratic Venezuela in “building new and sound institutions.”
Asked whether the Venezuelan government might have known her whereabouts since January, Machado told reporters: “I don’t think they have known where I have been, and certainly they would have done everything to stop me from coming here.”
The 58-year-old didn't give details of how she got to Norway but thanked “all those men and women that risked their lives so that I could be here today.”
“One day I will be able to tell you, because certainly I don’t want to put them in risk right now," she added. “It was quite an experience, but I think it’s worthwhile being here with you, telling the world what’s happening in Venezuela, what it means to you as Norwegians and as Europeans or from all the places where you come from, why Venezuela matters for the world.”
She said that “we decided to fight until the end and Venezuela will be free” and that, if Maduro's government is still in place when she returns, “certainly I will be with my people and they will not know where I am. We have ways to do that and take care of us.”
Flight tracking data show that the plane Machado flew to Oslo from Bangor, Maine.
Machado won an opposition primary election and intended to challenge Maduro in last year’s presidential election, but the government barred her from running for office. Retired diplomat Edmundo González took her place.
The lead-up to the election on July 28, 2024, saw widespread repression, including disqualifications, arrests and human rights violations. That increased after the country’s National Electoral Council, which is stacked with Maduro loyalists, declared the incumbent the winner.
