Venezuelan leader María Corina Machado, Nobel Peace Prize winner, arrived in Oslo on Thursday hours after her daughter received the award on her behalf, the Nobel Committee announced.
“I can confirm that María Corina Machado arrived in Oslo and is on her way to come here,” declared the president of the committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, journalists and supporters gathered at the Grand Hotel, the usual accommodation of the Nobel laureates.
The opposition leader, awarded for her fight for democracy, will go “directly to meet her family” in Oslo, Frydnes said. His former campaign manager, Magali Meda, indicated that Machado will also go out to the hotel balcony “because he wants to greet them.”
Meda spoke to supporters waiting to see her in central Oslo.
Many sang traditional songs with the cuatro, a typical Venezuelan instrument, and shouted slogans for a “free Venezuela.”
Machado has not been seen in public for months after receiving threats.
– “Fight for freedom” –
In the speech read on Wednesday by his daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, the leader called to “fight for freedom.”
At the award ceremony, the president of the Norwegian Nobel Committee addressed a message to the Venezuelan leader.
“Mr. Maduro: You must accept the electoral results and resign from your position,” said Frydnes, interrupted by applause from the public.
Sosa Machado received the gold medal and the award diploma, worth 1.2 million dollars. In the front row, Machado’s mother, Corina Parisca, her three sisters and two other children of the winner followed the ceremony.
The speech evoked “the fight against a brutal dictatorship”, in which “we have tried everything.”
Machado denounced “crimes against humanity, documented by the United Nations” and “state terrorism, used to bury the will of the people.”
“If we want to have democracy, we must be willing to fight for freedom,” he said.
Since October, when the award was announced, the presence in Oslo of Machado, who has not been seen in public since January, when he participated in a protest in Caracas against Maduro, has been a mystery.
Dozens of exiled Venezuelans, political allies of Machado and the presidents of Argentina, Panama, Ecuador and Paraguay traveled to the Norwegian capital for the ceremony.
However, after announcing the prizewinner’s presence on Saturday, the Nobel Institute reported that Machado would not arrive on time due to “a trip in a situation of extreme danger.”
This is not the first time that a Nobel Peace Prize winner has not been able to attend the awards ceremony. It already happened with the Iranian Narges Mohammadi (2023), the Chinese Liu Xiaobo (2010) or the Burmese Aung San Suu Kyi (1991).
It is unknown how the opposition leader managed to leave Venezuela and also how she intends to return to the country.
“I wouldn’t want her to be detained, I wouldn’t be happy,” US President Donald Trump declared this Wednesday in response to questions from the press at the White House.
Last month, Venezuela’s attorney general told AFP that Machado would be considered a “fugitive” if she left her country, where she is accused of “acts of conspiracy, incitement to hatred and terrorism.”
Benedicte Bull, a professor specializing in Latin America at the University of Oslo, said Machado “risks arrest if she returns, although the authorities have shown more restraint with her than with many others, because an arrest would have very strong symbolism.”
On the other hand, “he is the undisputed leader of the opposition, but if he remains in exile for a long time, I think that will change and he will progressively lose political influence,” he added.
Machado went into hiding after the July 2024 presidential elections that granted Nicolás Maduro a third term. The results were not recognized by the United States, the European Union and several Latin American countries.
The opposition leader maintains that Maduro stole the elections from his candidate, Edmundo González Urrutia, and published copies of the voting records as proof of fraud. Chavismo denies the accusations.
Praised for her efforts in favor of democracy in Venezuela, her opponents reproach her for her affinity for Trump, to whom she dedicated her Nobel Prize.
The Republican president ordered a major military deployment in the Caribbean that has led to several US attacks against alleged “drug boats” that have left 87 dead. Additionally, this Wednesday US forces seized an oil tanker.
Maduro assures that the true objective of these operations is to overthrow him and seize Venezuela’s oil reserves.