Nobel Peace Prize laureate Maria Corina Machado said she planned to take her award back to Venezuela, but declined to say when she would return to her home country after leaving in great secrecy to receive the honour.
The Venezuelan opposition leader arrived in Oslo early today, failing to reach the Norwegian capital in time for the prize ceremony held hours earlier.
The 58-year-old engineer had secretly left Venezuela for Oslo in defiance of a decade-long travel ban imposed by authorities and after spending more than a year in hiding.
"I came to receive the prize on behalf of the Venezuelan people and I will take it back to Venezuela at the correct moment," she told reporters at Norway's parliament declining to say when this would be.
Speaking in Oslo, the laureate described the joy of meeting her children - who live in exile - for the first time in about two years.
"For over 16 months I haven't been able to hug or touch anyone," Ms Machado told the BBC.
"Suddenly in the matter of a few hours I've been able to see the people I love the most, and touch them and cry and pray together."
Ms Machado greeted dozens of people from the balcony of Oslo's Grand Hotel, where Nobel laureates traditionally stay, waving and singing the national anthem along with the crowd, which waved Venezuelan flags and filmed her with their mobile phones.
Later, Ms Machado came down to the street and climbed over crowd barriers to hug and shake hands with people who had gathered in the cold for the chance to see her.
"After all these months in which she has been in hiding and her life has been in danger, I think seeing her together with the entire Venezuelan diaspora is a pleasure and a reassurance that she is safe, and it is also a way for the Venezuelan cause to stay alive and a way to put more pressure on the regime," said Diana Luna, a Mexican-German woman in the crowd.
Ms Machado's daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, earlier accepted the Nobel Prize in her name and delivered a speech by her mother in which she said democracies must be prepared to fight for freedom in order to survive.
In her speech, Ms Machado said that the prize held profound significance, not only for her country but for the world.
"It reminds the world that democracy is essential to peace," she said via her daughter, whose voice cracked when she spoke of her mother.
"And more than anything, what we Venezuelans can offer the world is the lesson forged through this long and difficult journey: that to have a democracy, we must be willing to fight for freedom."
Left by boat
Ms Machado left Venezuela by boat on Tuesday and travelled to the Caribbean island of Curacao, from where she departed on a private plane for Norway, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The source, who had been briefed by Ms Machado's camp, said her escape from the Venezuelan coast was handled by her security staff. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Ms Machado's travel to Curacao, which was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
Speaking at her hotel early this morning, Ms Machado said she plans to return to Venezuela despite the risks she faces.
"Of course I'm going back," she told the BBC.
A large portrait of a smiling Ms Machado hung in the Oslo City Hall to represent her at the ceremony. The audience cheered and clapped when Norwegian Nobel Committee head Joergen Watne Frydnes said during his speech that Ms Machado would be coming to Oslo.
Evoking previous laureates Nelson Mandela and Lech Walesa, he said fighters for democracy were expected "to pursue their aims with a moral purity their opponents never display".
"This is unrealistic. It is unfair," he said.
"No democracy operates in ideal circumstances. Activist leaders must confront and resolve dilemmas that we onlookers are free to ignore. People living under the dictatorship often have to choose between the difficult and the impossible."
'A choice that must be renewed each day'
In 2024, Ms Machado was barred from running in the presidential election, despite having won the opposition's primary by a landslide. She went into hiding in August 2024 after authorities expanded arrests of opposition figures following the disputed vote.
The electoral authority and top court declared President Nicolas Maduro the winner, but international observers and the opposition say its candidate handily won and the opposition has published ballot box-level tallies as evidence of its victory.
"Freedom is a choice that must be renewed each day, measured by our willingness and our courage to defend it. For this reason, the cause of Venezuela transcends our borders," she said in her prepared speech.
"A people who choose freedom contribute not only to themselves, but to humanity."
In her speech, Ms Machado said Venezuelans did not realise in time that their country was sliding into what she described as a dictatorship.
Referring to the late president Hugo Chavez, who was elected in 1999 and held power until his death in 2013, Ms Machado said: "By the time we recognised how fragile our institutions had become, a man who had once led a military coup to overthrow democracy, was elected president. Many thought that charisma could substitute the rule of law.
"From 1999 onward, the regime dismantled our democracy."
Mr Maduro, in power since 2013, says US President Donald Trump is trying to overthrow him to gain access to Venezuela's vast oil reserves and that Venezuelan citizens and armed forces will resist any such attempt.
Venezuela has become a 'criminal hub'
When Ms Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize in October, she dedicated it in part to Mr Trump, who has said he himself deserved the honour.
She has aligned herself with hawks close to him who argue that Mr Maduro has links to criminal gangs that pose a direct threat to US national security, despite doubts raised by the US intelligence community.
Speaking at a press conference, Ms Machado was asked if she would support a US invasion of her home country, and said her country had already been invaded by actors such as Russian and Iranian agents and drug cartels.
"This has turned Venezuela into the criminal hub of the Americas. And what sustained the regime is a very powerful and strongly funded repression system," she said alongside Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.
"Where do those funds come from? Well, from drug trafficking, from the black market of oil, from arms trafficking, and from human trafficking. We need to cut those flows."
Venezuela's Ministry of Information did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Ms Machado's remarks.
Machado says Trump's actions are 'decisive'
Her appearance in Norway comes amid soaring tensions between Venezuela and the United States, with the Trump administration having ordered more than 20 military strikes in recent months against alleged drug-trafficking vessels in the region.
Mr Maduro and his government have always denied any involvement in crime and have accused the US of seeking regime change out of a desire to control Venezuela's natural resources, especially its vast oil reserves.
Yesterday, Mr Trump said the US had seized an oil tanker under sanctions off the coast of Venezuela, in a move that sent oil prices higher as speculation over further US action mounted.
In response, the Venezuelan government in a statement accused the US of "blatant theft" and described the seizure as "an act of international piracy". It said it would denounce the incident before international bodies.
"I believe that President Trump's actions have been decisive to reach the point where we are right now, in which the regime is weaker than ever," Ms Machado said at a later event, referring to the Venezuelan government.
She said Mr Maduro's rule would come to an end and there was a need to prepare a transition in her country.
"I'm going back to Venezuela regardless of when Maduro goes out. He's going out, but the moment will be determined by when I'm finished doing the things that I came out to do," she added, without going into further detail.
