SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela on Sunday, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the United States his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela.

In a post on the social media platform X, directed at President Nicolás Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year.

“The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” wrote the self-styled “world’s coolest dictator,” a man who himself has been accused of locking up political opponents.

“However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that includes the repatriation of 100% of the 252 Venezuelans who were deported, in exchange for the release and surrender of an identical number (252) of the thousands of political prisoners you hold.”

Among those he listed were the son-in-law of former Venezuelan presidential candidate Edmundo González, a number of political leaders seeking asylum in the Argentine embassy in Venezuela, and what he said were 50 detained citizens from a number of different countries across the world.

Bukele also listed the mother of opposition leader María Corina Machado, whose house the political leader has said was surrounded by Venezuelan police in January.

Bukele said he would ask El Salvador’s foreign ministry to be in contact with the Maduro government.

Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office responded Sunday night, calling Bukele’s statements “cynical” and referred to the Salvadoran leader as a “neofascist.”

It demanded Bukele’s government provide the Venezuelan government with a list of the people detained as well as their legal status and medical reports.

“The treatment received by Venezuelans in the United States and El Salvador, constitutes a serious violation of international human rights law and constitutes a crime against humanity,” it said in the statement.

The proposal comes as El Salvador has come under sharp international scrutiny for accepting Venezuelans and Salvadorans deported by the Trump administration, which accused them of being alleged gang members with little evidence.

Deportees are locked up in a “mega-prison” know as the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), built by the Bukele government during his crackdown on the country’s gangs.

Controversy has only continued after it was revealed that a Maryland father married to a U.S. citizen, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, was deported by mistake. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the U.S. government to facilitate his return, but there’s no sign of that happening.

El Salvador’s archbishop José Luis Escobar Alas on Sunday called on Bukele not “to allow our country to become a big international prison.”

Despite the controversy, Bukele maintained that all of the people he has kept in the prison were “part of part of an operation against gangs like the Tren de Aragua in the United States.”

Janetsky reported from Mexico City.

This version has corrected Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s citizenship status.

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Nicolás Maduro extended his increasingly repressive rule over Venezuela until 2031 when he was sworn in Friday, despite credible evidence that his opponent won the latest election and following protests against his plan to serve a third six-year term.

Venezuela’s legislative palace, where Maduro was sworn in, was heavily guarded by police, military and intelligence officers. Crowds of people, many sporting pro-Maduro T-shirts, gathered in adjacent streets and a nearby plaza.

On Thursday, as hundreds of anti-Maduro protesters took to the streets of the capital, Caracas, aides to opposition leader María Corina Machado said she was briefly detained by security forces and coerced into recording videos.

The popular former lawmaker, whom the government has barred from running for office, had emerged from months of hiding to join the rally to demand that opposition candidate Edmundo González be sworn in as president instead of Maduro.

Machado addressed the rally then left on a motorcycle with her security convoy. Machado’s press team later announced on social media that security forces “violently intercepted” her convoy. Her aides then confirmed to The Associated Press that the opposition hardliner had been detained.

Leaders in the Americas and Europe condemned the government for suppressing opposition voices and demanded her release. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump expressed his support for Machado and González.

“These freedom fighters should not be harmed, and MUST stay SAFE and ALIVE!” Trump said on Truth Social.

Maduro’s supporters denied that Machado was arrested, saying government opponents were spreading fake news to generate an international crisis.

The brouhaha ahead of Maduro’s inauguration adds to the litany of allegations of electoral fraud and brutal repression to silence dissent.

Electoral authorities loyal to the ruling party declared Maduro the winner hours after polls closed on July 28, but unlike in previous presidential elections, they did not provide detailed vote counts. The opposition, meanwhile, collected tally sheets from more than 80% of electronic voting machines, posted them online and said the tallies show González won twice as many votes as Maduro.

Global condemnation over the lack of transparency prompted Maduro to ask the country’s high court — also filled with allies of his United Socialist Party of Venezuela — to audit the election results. The court reaffirmed Maduro’s victory without providing thorough evidence and encouraged the electoral council to release the vote counts. But neither the council nor the ruling party produced any evidence that Maduro had won, even though their voting center representatives also were entitled to tally sheets from every voting machine.

The U.S.-based Carter Center, which observed the election on the government’s invitation, declared the opposition-published tallies legitimate. Other election experts that the government allowed to witness the vote said polling records published online by the opposition faction appear to exhibit all of the original security features.

The dispute over the results prompted international outrage and nationwide protests. The government responded with full force, arresting more than 2,000 demonstrators and encouraging Venezuelans to report anyone they suspect to be a ruling-party adversary. More than 20 people were killed during the unrest and many protesters reported being tortured in custody.

It is unclear whether any heads of state were planning to attend Friday’s inauguration ceremony hosted by the ruling party-controlled National Assembly at the legislative palace in Caracas.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro, a close Maduro ally, said he would skip the event citing the detentions earlier in the week of another longtime Venezuelan opposition member and a human rights defender.

Maduro’s last inauguration, in 2019, was attended by Cuba’s President Miguel Diaz-Canel and then-Bolivian President Evo Morales. The 2018 election was widely considered a sham after his government banned major opposition parties from participating.

And it remains unclear if González, who left for exile in Spain in September, will fulfill his promise to return to Venezuela by Friday.

Government officials have repeatedly threatened González with arrest should he step on Venezuelan soil. On Tuesday, González said his son-in-law Rafael Tudares had been kidnapped in Caracas. González’s daughter, Mariana González de Tudares, suggested in a statement that the government was behind her husband’s disappearance.

“At what point did being related to Edmundo González Urrutia become a crime?” she said.