The Venezuelan public prosecutor summoned opposition leader Edmundo González Urrutia for questioning on Monday. The summons is based on a criminal investigation following the controversial presidential election in the country, which dictator Nicolás Maduro has claimed responsibility for.
“Citizen Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia” will be “summoned for questioning on August 26 at 10 a.m.,” prosecutors said on Saturday. The summons is part of an investigation into the opposition’s publication of electoral documents, which they believe show that Maduro has been clearly defeated.
Attorney General Tarek William Saab, who is considered an ally of Maduro, had hinted at the summons on Friday and said González Urrutia would have to explain his “disobedience” to the authorities.
Saab said the opposition website had “usurped” the powers of the official electoral council, the CNE, by publishing supposedly authentic election results.
The CNE, which declared Maduro the winner of the July 28 election with 52 percent of the votes cast, is also considered Maduro-friendly, but refuses to publish detailed results on the grounds that cyber hackers had manipulated the data.
Maduro called for the arrest of Gonzalez Urrutia, who has not been seen in public since leading an opposition march on July 30.
The United States, the European Union, several Latin American countries and multilateral bodies refused to recognize Maduro’s claim of victory without seeing the exact result.
In protests in the hours following the vote, 25 people were killed, nearly 200 were injured and over 2,400 were arrested.
