Venezuela Issues - 2024

Disputes - international

Venezuela-Brazil: none identified

Venezuela-Colombia: dispute with Colombia over maritime boundary and Venezuelan administered Los Monjes Islands near the Gulf of Venezuela; Colombian-organized illegal narcotics and paramilitary activities penetrate Venezuela's shared border region; the border between the two countries was closed from March 2020 to October 2021 due to COVID, but goods and people fleeing poverty and violence continued to be smuggled from Venezuela into Colombia, and illegal narcotics and armed men flowed into Venezuela from Colombia; since the FARC disarmed in 2016, some former members have formed armed dissident groups that operate along the border

Venezuela-Guyana: claims all of the area west of the Essequibo River in Guyana, preventing any discussion of a maritime boundary; in 2018, Guyana initiated proceedings against Venezuela with the International Court of Justice (ICJ); Venezuela requested a direct dialogue to settle the dispute; the ICJ ruled that it had jurisdiction to hear the case in December 2020; in December 2023, the Venezuelan Government held a referendum on the disputed Essequibo region and announced measures to exert administrative control over the area 

Venezuela-various:  Venezuela claims Aves Island and thereby an economic exclusion Zone/continental shelf extending over a large portion of the eastern Caribbean Sea; Venezuela’s claim to Aves Island is disputed by Dominica and several other countries because the island has rich guano deposits useful in producing fertilizer and gunpowder, as well as large fish stocks and natural gas reserves; contraband smuggling (narcotics and arms), illegal migration, trafficking in animals, plants, lumber, illegal exploitation of mineral resources

Refugees and internally displaced persons

refugees (country of origin): 39,185 (Colombia) (mid-year 2022)

note: As of May 2023, approximately 7.32 Venezuelan refugees and migrants reside worldwide with 83.9% in Latin America and the Caribbean

Trafficking in persons

tier rating: Tier 3 — Venezuela does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making any efforts to do so, therefore, Venezuela remained on Tier 3; the Maduro regime (which is not recognized by the US) took some steps to address trafficking, arresting some traffickers and identifying some victims; however, the regime did not report assisting victims or prosecuting or convicting traffickers; the Maduro regime continued to provide support and a permissive environment for non-state armed groups and other armed groups that forcibly recruited and used children for armed conflict or forced criminality; the armed groups also engaged in sex trafficking and forced labor while operating with impunity; the regime did not make sufficient efforts to curb the armed groups’ forced recruitment and exploitation of children (2023)

trafficking profile:

human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Venezuela, as well as Venezuelans abroad; more than six million Venezuelans, facing continued economic, political, and humanitarian crises, have fled to neighboring countries and are at risk of human trafficking; traffickers exploit Venezuelans in Aruba, The Bahamas, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Curacao, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Germany, Guyana, Haiti, Iceland, Macau, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Spain, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, and Uruguay; Venezuelan women and girls are particularly at risk of sex trafficking in neighboring countries; women, including transgender women, have been lured to Spain and Germany with fraudulent employment offers and subjected to forced surgical procedures before being exploited in commercial sex; Venezuelan men are exploited in forced labor in other countries, including Aruba and Curacao; within Venezuela, Venezuelan women and girls are subjected to sex trafficking and child sex tourism; children are exploited in sex trafficking and forced labor, including in farming, domestic service, construction, mining, and criminal groups; non-state armed groups—including illegal Colombian groups near border regions—force some Venezuelans into criminal acts, use as child soldiers, and exploitation in sex trafficking and forced labor; members of the Maduro regime most likely tolerate or sometimes collude with the armed groups’ trafficking; sex and labor trafficking victims from South American, Caribbean, Asian, and African countries have been reported in Venezuela; the Cuban Government may be exploiting Cuban workers in medical missions in Venezuela (2023)

Illicit drugs

a major drug-transit country and trafficking route in the Western Hemisphere for illegal drugs mainly cocaine;  government depends on rents from narco-trafficking, along with other illicit activities, to maintain power;  evidence of coca cultivation and cocaine production in domestic drug laboratories suggests the country is now also an illicit drug-producing country;  a major source of precursor or essential chemicals used in the production of illicit narcotics