Caracas Chronicles

How bad did Venezuela get? Among the many ways to answer that question, we can consider Fund for Peace’s Fragile State Index 2019, one of the multidisciplinary approaches that can tell the magnitude of our drama.

Venezuela needed more than four centuries to become a real country. Now, it has started dismantling again, along the petrostate and the army that used to hold it together.

As in the country’s pre-modern era, Venezuelans are moving from their hometowns to the capital, or other cities, looking for water, power, food, jobs. Here are a few testimonies of an increasingly common phenomenon.

The representatives of the caretaker president are critical to build and sustain the pressure on Maduro. But several complications muddle the always troubled waters of the ancient trade of international relations.

Venezuelan refugees need international protection. One of the instruments that can be of use includes a definition of “refugees’ that could apply to our fellow nationals.

On July 5th, 1910, Venezuela’s Military Academy was created to make a nation-building army out of the force that finally stabilized the country.

After the High Commissioner’s high-profile visit last month, the full UN report about human rights in Venezuela was made public. And it irrefutably confirms what many try to deny.

Michelle Bachelet issued her 18-page report about our crisis one day earlier. It makes Maduro and everyone around him look inefficient and cruel. Nobody can say that Venezuelans have been lying anymore.

While the number of Venezuelans seeking refuge keeps growing, which countries are receiving them, and under what conditions?

What does the torture-murder of Captain Rafael Acosta Arévalo have to do with a simultaneous outburst of violence in Portland, Oregon by Antifa (“anti-fascist”) protestors? Just everything, that’s all.

The Organization of American States expects that a quarter of the population of Venezuela will have left the country by the end of 2020. What’s the hemisphere doing about it?

In order to defeat disinformation, it's essential to understand how it works. A new report offers details about the hegemony's efforts to keep Venezuelans confused about what's going on.

As Pride Month comes to an end, Caracas Chronicles brings a small list of some openly gay, lesbian and transgender Venezuelans from every stripe that we can look up to and feel proud of.

In a country deeply ravaged by a complex humanitarian emergency, hormones are just a part of the innumerable supplies gone from the health system, and they're essential for those desperate to reach their true self.

In the past six months, three Venezuelan boats carrying Venezuelan migrants have sunk at sea. At least 50 people have disappeared on these dangerous journeys to the neighboring insular States.

The fuel crisis reaches the Venezuelan south, drivers in Bolivar State spend between 24 to 96 hours waiting to fill up their tanks. New social habits and political tricks converge in the new normality of this oil-producing country without fuel.

A bittersweet account—and instruction manual—about experiencing a demonstration in extreme heat and risk of violent death, from a baseball-loving protester in apocalyptic Maracaibo.

The creators of beloved website El Chigüire Bipolar launched an animated show online, made by investigative reporters, where Monty Python-like shorts explain the delirious absurdity of Latin American current affairs.

Isa used to be a Venezuelan woman. Today, he is a migrant transgender man. The story of his transition can't be understood without the story of his migration. Isa is a man because he left Venezuela.

The Maduro regime is worse than negligent with women: it made them live again without the rights and securities they acquired during 20th century democracy

The so called colectivos have all the support from the military and the police to keep this city of Western Venezuela from rebelling against the regime.

Bachelet leaves Venezuela today. Bachelet heard and met with both victims of human rights violations and human rights activists. She'll talk to the press today, before she leaves the country and her official report will be presented in two weeks.

A new NPR report shows how charities and NGOs, the last hope for thousands of neglected victims of Venezuela’s crisis, are facing extreme difficulties to keep doing their already diminished work.

On June 19th, 1923, Juan Vicente Gómez’s brother was murdered inside the official seat of Venezuelan presidents. Miraflores was then empty for 12 years.

In the middle of Merida’s mountains, an isolated village learned how to keep living while ignoring the widespread socio-economic collapse of Venezuela.

A true Venezuelan institution, the band just played in Berkeley, California, and gave us a chance to think on the meaning of being an artist in today’s Venezuela, and how does it feel to be censored by your own government.

Marianne Diaz Hernández was recently recognized with an important international award, after her years of activism and research on the now universal, but poorly understood, field of digital rights.

Harold Añez and Yerwins Elías were two teenagers who dreamed of becoming big leaguers. An academy in Colombia was waiting for them. They kept training while they found the resources for the trip, but their plans went wrong.

PanAm Post published an article purportedly revealing corrupt activities in Cúcuta, involving the delegation appointed by Juan Guaidó to handle expenses for soldiers who deserted to Colombia on February 23rd. The veracity of this accusation is yet to be seen, but the storm it caused underscores the need for more transparency in the opposition's camp.

The rappers of Free Convict aren’t ordinary singers: they’re former inmates now trying to keep Venezuelan kids far from jail. With Caracas Mi Convive and Alimenta la Solidaridad, they work to share what they learned.