Good afternoon. Thank you every much to every one of you for welcoming us here today and for your solidarity as usual.
Today I come to ask the Government of Canada, through you, not to cease in your actions and efforts, and to help us get rid of this regime. These are people who steal the resources of Venezuela. In June 2012, this committee issued a report. We need an update. I call on the Government of Canada to join with the five countries of Latin America to denounce the regime in the International Criminal Court over the next few days.
The OAS Secretary General and the High Commissioner of Human Rights are bringing forward international criminal law that will help to destroy the government, because in Venezuela the judiciary is an instrument to carry out the totalitarian and criminal plans of the executive branch of Venezuela.
Today it is a concentration camp. It is an open-air jail. It is a rogue state. Even relatives of the president of the country are accused of drug trafficking. There have been violations of the Inter-American Democratic Charter and possible commission of crimes against humanity, including murder, arbitrary detention and the most horrible torture and sexual violence and forced disappearance, with one of the highest levels of corruption in Latin America. Institutions are used as a tool to destroy the rule of law.
Over the last two years, 2.3 million people have fled the country, and 1.6 million did so in 2017. Since 2006, more than four million Venezuelans have left the country, the largest-ever exodus on the continent, 12% of the population. It destabilizes the region.
There are 1.3 million of these people who are malnourished; 87% live in poverty and 61% live in extreme poverty.
The scarcity of medicine has reached 80%, and 90% for cancer. AIDS medications don't exist. Only 7% of emergency and 8% of operating rooms are operating, and 73 people die of cancer every day because they don't have prolonged treatment. Hemophiliacs, diabetics, or those who have kidney or heart disease are dying every week. Among Parkinson's patients, 50% don't have medicine. Since 2016, 50% of patients with HIV have not received medicine.
About 50% of hospital staff have fled the country. Doctors and nurses prefer to quit their jobs and not be found responsible for people who died because of a lack of medicine.
The school dropout rate is 45% because the children don't have anything to eat and they faint in school. Fifty-five percent of children under five years of age are malnourished, according to Codevida; 85% of the population doesn't have access to basic products, and at least half of the population only eats twice a day, and they're not getting any protein.
Approximately 340 people are in jail for political reasons. More than 8,000 people are being tried for simply opposing the government. Crimes such as arbitrary detention and torture and forced disappearance have expanded to the family members of people who are being prosecuted. Wives, children, cousins and grandparents are kidnapped by the security agencies and pro-government militias. They are mistreated and tortured to force them to say where the person is who's being sought. Then they are released as if nothing had happened.
These incidents of torture, which I used in my complaint before the International Criminal Court, seem to come straight out of the Nazi Holocaust or Stalinist times.
They use electric shocks to remove finger nails. They drown people in their feces and they destroy genitals by beating and applying electric shocks. There are civilian armed groups taking part in these acts at clandestine torture centres, which are located throughout the capital and are commanded by the intelligence services. As I said, currently there are 147 armed forces officers who are in jail for conspiracy or rebellion—the best in their classes. Some are generals. Some are non-commissioned officers. At least 70% of them have been subjected to torture and mistreatment during their period in custody, and they still are mistreated.
Finally, I'd like to thank all of you for listening to us, and I hope that Canada, as a democratic country with strong institutions, backs the complaint that these five countries are going to bring before the International Criminal Court.
Thank you very much for listening.