Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodríguez announced on Friday, 30 January, that her government would push an amnesty law through parliament. Covering political offences committed since 1999, the year in which Hugo Chávez, founder of the ruling chavista movement, came to power, the legislation could be approved as early as this week. She also announced the closure of the country’s most notorious torture centre, the Helicoide prison in western Caracas.

After a dizzying few weeks of change, the latest announcement has reinforced the widespread sensation that the country has begun to breathe again after years of economic and political asphyxiation. Almost 350 political prisoners have been released since U.S. special forces staged their daring night-time raid to snatch President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores and spirit them off to a jail in New York on 3 January. Over the weekend, U.S. Chargé d’Affaires Laura Dogu landed in Caracas with a view to setting up a diplomatic mission for the first time since relations were severed in 2019.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s three-stage plan to “run” Venezuela prioritises economic stabilisation, and the effects are already being felt. Washington has taken charge of marketing Venezuelan oil and disbursing the proceeds. The first tranche paid to Caracas has reined in the runaway dollar exchange rate and dampened fears of inflation. That should soon bring relief to ordinary Venezuelans, over 80 per cent of whom live in poverty and struggle to afford basic goods in a partially dollarised economy.

Equally important, Venezuela is opening up again to the outside world. Last week American Airlines said it hoped to resume flights between Miami and Caracas after a seven-year pause, during which it has been impossible to fly direct from Venezuela to the U.S. Diplomatic, consular and commercial relations with other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean are also likely to slowly come back to normal. Washington has taken the first steps toward dismantling the severe economic sanctions imposed under Trump’s first administration, and there is a flurry of interest among foreign companies, particularly in the energy and financial sectors.

Amid the optimism, there are still important caveats. Passing an amnesty law will do little to dismantle the apparatus of repression that has sustained the chavista movement in power. Profound institutional reform will require a far-reaching purge of the security and intelligence services to remove, or at least sideline, the most egregious human rights violators. To fully restore political rights, Caracas will also need to end censorship and repeal laws that make dissent a crime.

Thus far, reforms have been dictated by negotiations between Caracas and Washington, bypassing Venezuelans, most of whom voted for neither government. Opposition leader María Corina Machado continues to praise Washington, but she and fellow critics of the government have work to do healing their internal divisions and rebuilding a movement capable of making demands not only of Rodríguez but also of the U.S. Without that, Venezuela’s political opening may soon run out of steam.