Nicolás Maduro tells New York court new torture allegations are ‘false’

People protest against Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores outside a federal courthouse in New York on Thursday. Photograph: Sarah Yenesel/EPAView image in fullscreenPeople protest against Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores outside a federal courthouse in New York on Thursday.

Photograph: Sarah Yenesel/EPANicolás MaduroNicolás Maduro tells New York court new torture allegations are ‘false’Rewritten indictment accuses ex-Venezuela president and wife Cilia Flores of leading campaign of torture.

Prefer the Guardian on GoogleNicolás Maduro insisted on Thursday during an appearance in a New York court that torture allegations in a rewritten drug trafficking indictment against the deposed Venezuelan president and his wife were “false accusations”.

Maduro, amarrado nos tornozelos, foi levado ao tribunal para enfrentar as novas acusações que o acusam de liderar uma campanha de repressão patrocinada pelo Estado que torturou dezenas de vítimas, incluindo três americanos.

Judge Alvin K Hellerstein entered a not-guilty plea on behalf of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. They were seized from their Caracas home by the US military in a night-time raid in January.

Hellerstein announced that he was entering the plea on behalf of Maduro after Maduro twice responded to the judge’s request to enter a plea by criticizing the indictment, saying it contained “false accusations and false testimony”.

According to the rewritten indictment, Maduro oversaw a violent torture system that beat, asphyxiated and delivered electric shocks to its victims. He is accused of personally recommending torture methods, receiving updates on specific victims’ treatment and threatening to kill one prisoner’s child as a form of psychological torture.

Flores, 70, a former attorney general, helped develop the repressive system and ordered the torture of some specific people, the indictment alleges.

Quando lhe pediram que apresentasse uma resposta, ela disse por meio de um intérprete: “Eu sou completamente inocente. Eu não sou culpada.”.

Maduro, who served as Venezuela’s president from 2013 until his capture in January, has been under investigation for years by the international criminal court over allegations of crimes against humanity, tied to his crackdown on opponents.

Prosecutors told the judge during the hearing that lawyers on both sides want the trial date moved from 1 June to 14 June.

Torture is a crime under international law and can be prosecuted outside the country where the abuse occurred and regardless of the victims’ nationality. But the prosecution of foreign officials in the US is exceedingly rare, having been tried only a few times, including against the son of the former Liberian president Charles Taylor, Russians responsible for war crimes in Ukraine and a former prison warden in Bashar Assad’s Syria.

No início deste ano, Maduro e sua esposa juraram inocência no processo de drogas dos US, que alegava que eles conspiraram para inundar os US com cocaína. Seus advogados afirmam que o caso deve ser julgado improcedente com base em imunidade, pois eles eram o líder e a primeira-dama de um país estrangeiro.

The revised indictment covers allegations of torture stretching back to Maduro’s ascent to power in 2013, when he took over as president from his mentor Hugo Chávez, who died of cancer that year.