Two days after finding her son after 4 months of being held hostage, Hélène Boursier said “that he was not so bad compared to everything he had experienced”.
“Long live liberty, long live equality, and long live fraternity.” These were the first words Camilo Castro spoke to the press, his voice hoarse with emotion, upon arriving in France on Sunday November 16 after four months of being held hostage in Venezuela. At his side, her arm pressed against her son’s, his mother Hélène Boursier welcomed him, as well as his father-in-law, at Orly airport, where he landed.
Soon after she disappeared in late June 2025 while crossing the border to renew her Colombian visa, her mother and stepfather took action to find out her whereabouts. This Tuesday morning, he testified in front of the ICI Occitanie microphone.
Regarding the conditions of his detention: “there was psychological torture, that’s for sure. He minimized it a lot, he believed that he was lucky compared to other people,” said Hélène Boursier, who remained careful about what she could reveal “because there are still a lot of people left in this prison.”
“He was interrogated”
According to Amnesty International, he is being held with other foreign nationals in a special section of El Rodeo prison, 40 km from Caracas.
“He is very connected to all the prisoners. It’s very difficult, it’s an ordeal for him, he needs to be free and not anyone else,” said Camilo Castro’s mother.
According to him, he would keep the telephone numbers of relatives of former fellow detainees to communicate with their families after their release and “try to reassure them.”
The longtime Amnesty International activist, who lives near Toulouse, also said his son would be arrested “for no reason.” They could have denied him a visa and asked him to return to Colombia, he continued. That’s not what happened, he was interrogated. The border post called the Venezuelan secret police to decide to detain him and we don’t know the details.”
From now on, he believes “that things are not so bad compared to everything he has been through, since he theirs talk about it a lot.”
A 41-year-old yoga teacher, Camilo Castro wants to settle permanently in the country, where he is building a house not far from the Kogi Amerindian region, a people founded in Colombia for 500 years. He was known among farmers and tourists “for his austere lifestyle and his work as a yoga teacher,” according to a Colombian newspaper.
Emmanuel Macron announced his release on November 16 at X and shared his “relief for his loved ones”, thanking “everyone who worked for his release”.
