Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado said she is now safe after her aides said she was "intercepted" at a protest in Caracas on the eve of President Nicolas Maduro's inauguration. Machado's political group wrote on X that she had been "violently intercepted" on Thursday while leaving the rally. In a later update, her team posted that "during the period of her kidnapping she was forced to record several videos and was later released." Machado posted a statement on her X account late Thursday indicating she would give more details later. "I am now in a safe place and more determined than ever before to continue with you UNTIL THE END!" she wrote. "Tomorrow I will tell you what happened today and what is coming." "I have never felt so proud to be Venezuelan. Thank you, thank you, to all the citizens who took to the streets to claim our victory on July 28th and to OWN IT!" she added. Fear of repression in Venezuela has escalated in recent days as the inauguration of Maduro's third term approaches on Friday, following last year's contested presidential election. The Venezuelan government has denied detaining Machado, however. Speaking at a pro-government protest, Venezuela's Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello accused the opposition of "lying that the government had captured Maria Corina" for publicity. The country's Attorney General Tarek William Saab accused Machado of creating "theatre to be victimized" and of attempting to carry out a "psychological operation to unleash acts of violence" ahead of Maduro's inauguration. "They have sought to darken - without achieving it - a day of joy for the Venezuelan people, like tomorrow, January 10," Saab said in a statement shared with CNN. Maduro was proclaimed winner of the presidential election in July by electoral authorities under the tight control of the ruling Socialist Party. But Venezuela's opposition, led by Machado, published thousands of voting tallies claiming that their own candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, had actually won the vote with 67% against Maduro's 30%. Independent observers such as the Carter Center and the Colombian Electoral Mission, as well as CNN's own analysis, have since found the opposition tallies to be legitimate. Machado's appearance at the rally was her first public appearance in months, since a government crackdown on Venezeulan opposition figures and their supporters following the vote. "I am here," she posted on X earlier on Thursday, along with a video of herself at the protest, wearing jeans and the colors of the Venezuelan flag. In video distributed by Reuters on Thursday afternoon, a figure purported to be Machado wades through a crowd of protesters in Caracas, wearing a black motorcycle helmet and jacket. The demonstrators jostle and follow the figure, some shouting "Viva Venezuela!" From another angle, Reuters footage captures the same figure on the back of a motorbike, riding down a busy street in Caracas as demonstrators run in its wake Asked by CNN's Isa Soares earlier this week what would happen if she were arrested, Machado acknowledged the risk. "We're taking one day at a time, Isa. I am quite conscious of my responsibilities," she said. "But also, we know that this is a cost that transcends every single one of us. So, we need to do this. I am going to be with our people tomorrow." Panama's President José Raúl Mulino denounced Machado's apparent detention on X soon after the news broke. "Panama demands full freedom of @MariaCorinaYA, as well as respect for her personal integrity," Mulino wrote. "The dictatorial regime is responsible for her life!" The US said it was "tracking very closely" the reports of Machado's detention. "We condemn such arrests, repression and intimidation, which cannot obscure the fact that Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia is the true winner of the July 28 elections," the White House said in a statement. After Machado's release, US President-elect Donald Trump said she and opposition leader Gonzalez are "peacefully expressing the voices and the WILL of the Venezuelan people." "These freedom fighters should not be harmed, and MUST stay SAFE and ALIVE!," Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social. Rival groups of demonstrators gathered throughout Venezuela's capital Caracas on the eve of the inauguration. In several parts of Caracas on Thursday, crowds of opposition supporters slowly swelled with people waving flags and calling for libertad (freedom). Supporters were also seen holding "Gonzalez Presidente" signs and blowing vuvuzelas. Reuters reports an estimated 7,000 participated in the opposition rally in Caracas. Meanwhile in Venezuela's largest barrio Petare, Maduro supporters also assembled in what they call a "march for peace and joy." Gonzalez, who has vowed to return to Caracas this week despite the threat of arrest, started the day in the Dominican Republic where he met Dominican President Luis Abinader and other regional former leaders. "We Venezuelans will soon regain our freedom," Gonzalez said in a speech in Santo Domingo. — CNN
