A United Nations-mandated probe said Wednesday that Venezuela's apparatus of repression remains largely intact despite a reduction in some abuses following President Nicolas Maduro's removal from power earlier this year, cautioning that the country has not made a fundamental break with years of authoritarian rule. The independent fact-finding mission, reporting to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva, said Maduro's capture in January led to a fall in long-term politically motivated detentions and related abuses. But it concluded that the changes since then do not amount to structural reform of the institutions that carried out repression. "The measures of political liberalization adopted since that date remain partial, conditional and reversible at best," the mission said. It added that a departure from the harshest forms of repression may not be a "genuine and sustainable departure." ## Detentions Continue Despite Promise of Change The report, covering the period from September last year to July, found that hundreds of people, including real or perceived opponents of the government, remain arbitrarily detained for political reasons and continue to face harsh prison conditions, torture and ill-treatment. The mission documented allegations of beatings, electric shocks, prolonged isolation and other abuses at the El Rodeo I and Fuerte Guaicaipuro maximum-security prisons. Senior officials linked to past repression remain in key positions, and the security agencies, intelligence services and laws used to restrict dissent have not undergone meaningful reform, the experts found. The report also flagged extensive links between the state and armed civilian groups known as "colectivos," saying they have played a key role in intimidating perceived opponents with political, financial and logistical backing from state institutions. The United States has locked Maduro up to face trial on drug-trafficking charges, but left his Socialist Party government largely intact, to the disappointment of Venezuela's opposition, which says it was robbed of the 2024 vote and should be in power. Maduro's rule had been widely challenged by the opposition and numerous Western governments, including over the disputed 2024 presidential election. ## Some Advances, but Accountability Stalls The report acknowledged concrete steps by interim President Delcy Rodriguez, a Maduro ally, including prisoner releases, an amnesty law and the closure of El Helicoide, a detention facility long associated with arbitrary detention and torture. It also noted that civil society groups and opposition figures have gained greater latitude to organize and criticize authorities. Yet the mission said authorities have failed to advance accountability for past abuses, and it criticized Venezuela's decision to withdraw from the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. That withdrawal severs one of the few remaining international avenues for prosecuting alleged atrocities documented by the mission since it began work. The report also described the U.S. intervention that removed Maduro as a breach of international law, a finding that complicates the diplomatic picture surrounding the transition and places Washington's action under the same critical scrutiny as the practices of the government it displaced. Venezuela's mission to the U.N. in Geneva did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report's findings. ## What the Mission Wants Done Next The experts urged the government to release all political detainees, investigate alleged crimes against humanity, reform security institutions and dismantle the armed civilian groups involved in rights violations. Each of the four demands maps directly onto a finding in the report: the political detainees still held, the torture allegations at El Rodeo I and Fuerte Guaicaipuro, the intact security agencies and the state-backed colectivos. The mission framed its recommendations as a test of whether the measures introduced by the interim government are designed to be durable. In its reading, releases and amnesties that depend on continued goodwill do not substitute for legal reform, and the closure of a single facility does not dismantle a detention system in which the underlying laws and commands remain unchanged. The warning that liberalization could be reversed carries weight in a country where previous openings have collapsed. The mission's mandate has documented systematic violations since its creation, and Wednesday's report is the first to assess the period after Maduro's removal, making it a baseline for measuring whether the transition produces real institutional change. For the opposition, which has long argued that the state's coercive machinery outlasted individual leadership changes, the findings validate a central concern: that the same security and intelligence structures remain capable of repressing dissent regardless of who occupies the presidency. Opposition figures who expected a more decisive purge of Maduro-era officials are likely to cite the report in their case that the transition has preserved too much of the old order. For the interim government, the acknowledgment of prisoner releases and the closure of El Helicoide offers a partial counter-narrative, and officials can point to the mission's own finding that long-term politically motivated detentions have fallen since January. Human Rights Council members are expected to debate the report's recommendations in the coming days. Any follow-up action depends on whether Caracas engages with the mission or continues down the path of withdrawal from international oversight mechanisms, a choice that will shape Venezuela's human rights trajectory for years to come.