How have Venezuelan courts and the Attorney General responded to UN and ICC allegations since 2019?
Executive summary
Since 2019 Venezuela’s judicial apparatus and Attorney General Tarek William Saab have pursued a dual strategy: public cooperation and procedural pushback with the International Criminal Court while advancing domestic prosecutions that Caracas presents as proof of accountability; international bodies and victims’ groups argue those national efforts are limited to isolated, low‑level cases and therefore inadequate, a conclusion the ICC has repeatedly endorsed [1] [2] [3].
1. How Caracas framed and answered ICC inquiries: outward cooperation, inward critique
The Attorney General’s Office presented regular written reports and judicial documents to the ICC and signed memoranda of understanding and cooperation with Prosecutor Karim Khan — gestures Venezuela used to argue it was addressing alleged abuses domestically even as it publicly denounced the probe as politicized “judicial colonialism” [1] [4] [5]; Saab has also publicly pushed back against Hague process, insisting the ICC must inform Venezuelan authorities about cases under review and accusing the court of lacking transparency [6] [4].
2. What Venezuelan courts actually did on cases cited by the ICC: isolated prosecutions, limited scope
Venezuelan judicial institutions produced records of prosecutions and convictions that the Attorney General cited to demonstrate domestic action, but international actors and victims’ groups contend the national cases focus on low‑ranking perpetrators and isolated incidents rather than the systemic, contextual crimes the ICC’s mandate targets — a core reason the ICC concluded domestic mechanisms were insufficient [7] [3] [2].
3. The ICC’s assessment and Venezuela’s legal appeals: complementarity tested
The ICC Prosecutor and subsequently the Appeals Chamber found that Venezuela “has not sufficiently investigated crimes against humanity,” noting domestic probes did not examine the alleged systematic nature of abuses and tended to treat acts in isolation; Venezuela appealed the resumption of the ICC investigation but lost before the Appeals Chamber, which confirmed the court’s authority to resume its probe in 2023–2024 [8] [9] [2] [3].
4. The UN angle and Caracas’s countermeasures: sovereignty claims and expulsions
Beyond the ICC, interactions with UN human‑rights bodies have been fraught: Venezuelan authorities expelled a local office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, framing external reporting as improper interference while using such expulsions and rhetoric about sovereignty to buttress claims that international scrutiny is politicized [5]; international rights organizations and victim coalitions have, in turn, characterized the expulsions as part of a broader pattern of repression [2].
5. Domestic messaging, geopolitical framing, and the tug of competing narratives
The Maduro government has simultaneously asked international courts to examine alleged abuses by third states (Venezuela II referral against U.S. “unilateral coercive measures”) and insisted cooperation with the ICC on its own terms, which critics read as an effort to internationalize blame and delegitimize scrutiny of state practices; meanwhile NGOs and victim representatives argue Caracas’s filings and selective prosecutions amount to “lawfare” rhetoric intended to delay or dilute independent accountability [10] [6] [4].
6. The practical effect to date: proceedings continue, credibility contested
Practically, the ICC resumed its investigation after finding domestic efforts insufficient and established a technical presence in Caracas to facilitate work with local institutions, while Venezuelan prosecutors continue to press cases at home and to contest the ICC’s findings in diplomatic and legal fora — an outcome that leaves accountability in limbo: national measures exist on paper and in court records, but the ICC and many victims’ groups assert those measures fall short of meeting international criteria for addressing crimes against humanity [1] [8] [2].
Exactly which charges, trials and convictions will satisfy the ICC’s complementarity test remains contested and, based on available reporting, unresolved; these sources document the tug‑of‑war between Venezuelan authorities seeking to assert sovereignty and show domestic action, and international bodies concluding those actions are too narrow to displace ICC jurisdiction [3] [9].