“Thanks to a silent and joint work with the Venezuelan Football Federation and CONMEBOL, today, after 448 days, Nahuel Gallo returns to Argentina and can reunite with his family,” he posted Claudio “Chiqui” Tapia in his X account. The president of the AFA announced that the Argentine gendarme detained in Venezuela was released by the Bolivarian government led by Dercy Rodriguez.
The return to Argentina of the gendarme Nahuel Gallo This March 1, 2026 marked the closing of a chapter that lasted 448 days of detention in Venezuelabut it also sparked a political controversy over who made his return possible. Gallo, a first corporal of the Argentine National Gendarmeriehad been arrested on December 8, 2024 upon entering from Colombia to visit his partner and son, in what Caracas described as an irregular entry with alleged links to destabilizing activities, an accusation that Argentina always rejected and described as arbitrary.
From the first days of his arrest, his case generated diplomatic tensions between Buenos Aires and the Caribbean country. The Argentine Foreign Ministry issued official statements denouncing the irregularity of the detention, describing it as “blatant violation of their fundamental rights” and warning that “Argentina will not tolerate acts of this nature against its citizensThe detention was also condemned by international organizations such as the Organization of American States, which came to classify it as a “crime against humanity” based on its context and treatment.
For more than a year, the national administration headed by President Javier Milei He held public demands for the officer’s release. At different times, members of the Executive insisted that work was being done for his return: “We have not stopped a single day of working to see how to bring Nahuel Gallo… we are going to bring him“, the Minister of Security had declaredPatricia Bullrich, in December 2025. However, in recent months these claims have been combined with crossed accusations of inaction on the part of the Executive, in a context of tense relations with the Chavista regime and the absence of an Argentine ambassador in Caracas.
In the midst of this diplomatic dispute that did not achieve visible progress, a parallel effort arose until then unprecedented: the intervention of Claudio Tapiahead of the Argentine Football Association (AFA), who through contacts with the Venezuelan Football Federation and the political environment of Caracas built a “humanitarian bridge” to unblock the case. According to journalistic sources, Tapia established ties with the president of the Venezuelan Federation, Jorge Giménez Ochoa, close to the interim vice president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguezwhich facilitated informal conversations that led to the release of the gendarme.
The AFA’s action even included preparing a flight on a private aircraft linked to the entity to bring Gallo back, and the dissemination of a photograph in which he was seen with leaders of the sports association before his departure to Argentina. In a statement released by the same entity, Tapia thanked the Venezuelan authorities for “their sensitivity and willingness… demonstrating that sport can also be an effective bridge for understanding.” According to newspaper reports, the plane belongs to Baires Flya company that is usually associated with the environment of the highest representative of local football and was made available to facilitate his trip back to the country
Tapia’s management not only surprised the media, but also generated a strong reaction in the national government, deeply at odds with the highest figure in Argentine football, which chose to highlight in its statements other international support, such as that of the governments of Italy, USA and the NGO Foro Penal, without mentioning the participation of the AFA. This official silence was interpreted by sectors of the opposition as an attempt to minimize a success that the Executive had not achieved through traditional diplomatic channels for quite some time.
In that sense, within the local level, the representative Marcela Pagano He became one of the most critical voices of the official management. Through hisWe overcome official ineffectiveness… Everything that was hindered by the Foreign Ministry we deactivated through common sense”.
The intervention of Pagano, together with his partner Franco Bindi, in the diplomatic operation was also part of a series of complaints from different opposition sectors that questioned the lack of concrete results of Casa Rosada’s foreign policy in the case and the need to opt for alternative channels outside the ruling party to free Gallo. It is estimated that the Venezuelan context, after the arrest of Nicolás Maduro by the United States and the proclamation of Rodriguez as head of the Bolivarian Executive, influenced the favorable results.
The final operation that allowed Gallo to leave Venezuela was interpreted both as a humanitarian gesture by the Chavista regime in a context of political releases and as a triumph of parallel efforts that the traditional Argentine State had not carried out. Sources agree that, regardless of the route used, the priority was to ensure Gallo’s freedom and his soon reunion with his family.
Surprisingly, as this chapter closes, the figure of Tapia and Pagano emerge as unexpected actors on the diplomatic scene and domestic politics, which also opens a debate on the effectiveness of formal foreign policy in the face of informal networks in crisis cases like Gallo’s. Given this novelty, the question that remains is how Javier Milei’s government did not see it coming.
Image gallery
