The Venezuelan Observatory of Prisons (OVEP) reported this Monday that Hugo Enrique Marino Salas has been missing for seven years, without the authorities having provided information about his whereabouts.
The NGO points out that alleged officials of the General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (Dgcim) detained him on April 20, 2019 at the Maiquetía International Airport, and since then there has been no official information about him.
Marino Salas, an economist who graduated from the Central University of Venezuela and an expert in underwater rescue, had lived in Miami since at least 2013. He ran the company Sistemas Electrónico Acuáticos (SEA), specialized in the rescue of shipwrecks and aircraft black boxes.
He participated in high-profile international operations, such as the search for the Russian submarine Kursk and the search for remains of the Missoni empire at sea. In 2019 he traveled to Caracas for a brief family visit.
At 12:15 noon on April 20, he called his mother, Beatriz Salas, to confirm that he had arrived. That call was the last contact with him. Unofficial information indicates that he had been hired for an underwater rescue from a plane crash that occurred nearby.
The OVP, a non-governmental organization that defends the human rights of people deprived of liberty in Venezuela, recalled in its X account that the Venezuelan State did not provide a certificate of life, nor initiate an effective investigation, nor clarify the facts.
“This omission is not minor because, in cases of forced disappearance, silence also constitutes a form of violence,” the entity noted.
International organizations, including the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, documented the case and demanded responses from the Venezuelan Government.
To date, they have not received verifiable information. The disappearance is recorded as one of the longest cases of this type in the country.
The OVP demanded that the Public Ministry and the Ombudsman fulfill their constitutional mandate and act. He also demanded that the Government headed by Delcy Rodríguez deliver a timely, clear and verifiable response to Beatriz Salas, who for seven years has been demanding the whereabouts of her son without obtaining official answers.
“Disappearance does not prescribe, neither does silence. There will be justice,” concluded the Venezuelan Prisons Observatory.
