"I'm here. With you": María Corina Machado confirms her return to Venezuela

"I'm here. With you". With these words, María Corina Machado confirmed her return to Venezuela. The opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate had been in exile for nearly a year following her dramatic escape to receive the award in Sweden.

Machado, 60, had previously made at least seven attempts to return to Venezuela without success, according to sources within her party.

"Today is a very important day for Venezuelans"

As soon as the post went live, her ally and former presidential candidate Edmundo González Urrutia celebrated her return on the same social media platform. "Venezuela! I am so thrilled to announce that our leader, my dear María Corina, is on Venezuelan soil. Today is a very important day for Venezuelans."

"Very soon I'll be with you and with her so that our country can truly move toward freedom. You know it, this is until the very end," González Urrutia added in his message.

Video: Here's how Machado's arrival with her supporters unfolded

In exile in Panama, Machado has not yet provided details about her return to her country, although her supporters shared a video on social media of her arrival at the Basilica of Our Lady of the Divine Shepherd in Lara state.

Machado left Venezuela in December 2025 to accept the Nobel Prize, after spending nearly a year in hiding amid the wave of arrests triggered by Nicolás Maduro's controversial reelection in 2024.