OUT OF SIGHT, NOT OUT OF REACH The Global Scale and Scope of Transnational Repression Latin America Venezuelan opposition student leader, Lorent Gomez Saleh, hugs a friend after holding a press conference in Madrid on October 23, 2018. Image credit: Oscar Del Pozo/AFP via Getty Images. Transnational repression appears relatively rare in Latin America compared to other regions, although it is possible that the phenomenon is less visible due to the region’s enormous humanitarian crises, including the international displacement of millions of people due to political repression, organized crime, and natural disasters. Several extreme cases emerged from the brutal political crackdowns in Nicaragua and Venezuela, but unlike in other parts of the world, these do not appear to be part of broader campaigns of transnational repression. In the case of Nicaragua, the military has pursued across borders ex-contras who participated in the 2018 nationwide protests against the government. A local human rights organization documented what appears to be the Nicaraguan military’s targeted killing of three such men in Honduras near the border in June and July 2019.338 Exiled journalist Winston Potosme experienced an extreme form of coercion by proxy in April 2020, when men broke into his family’s home in Nicaragua and assaulted his father, and then sent Potosme threatening messages from his father’s phone.339 The 52 @FreedomHouse Nicaraguan government has been mentioned as a customer of the notorious commercial surveillance company NSO Group, but Freedom House did not find reports of the software’s deployment by the government outside Nicaragua.340 Venezuelan authorities have shown signs of trying to pursue exiles abroad, but with diminishing success. In 2014, the government was able to have two opposition leaders, Lorent Gómez Saleh and Gabriel Valles Sguerzi, unlawfully deported from neighboring Colombia.341 They spent four years in prison. Since then, the regime has not succeeded in having other dissidents brought back to the country or detained at the government’s request. This is despite attempts in some cases to have Interpol issue notices issued against individuals. The Venezuelan government has used mobility controls, cancelling the passports of dissidents within the country, sometimes as they are attempting to leave.342 There is some evidence that the government has forced exiles to record videos “thanking” Venezuelan authorities when they renew passports abroad.343 #TransnationalRepression