Jose Pereira, American previously held in Venezuela | Pod Hostage Diplomacy

Jose Pereira, American previously held in Venezuela

SPEAKERS

Jose Pereira, Daren Nair

Daren Nair  00:05

Welcome to Pod Hostage Diplomacy. We work to free hostages and the unjustly detained around the world. Together with their families, we share their stories and let you know how you can help bring them home.

Elizabeth Whelan  00:18

Now when it comes to using the family to get... for Russia to get what they want, if that's the case, they've picked the wrong family, because I'm not going to carry water for the Russian authorities.

Daren Nair  00:28

These are some of the most courageous and resilient people among us.

Mariam Claren  00:32

I never thought that my mother, Nahid Taghavi, will ever have a link to negotiations in Vienna about the JCPOA. That's so crazy.

Daren Nair  00:43

People who have never given up hope.

Paula Reed  00:46

Trevor told his girlfriend to tell me to to be strong so, I'm trying to be strong for Trevor.

Joey Reed  00:50

You know, if Trevor can cope with what he's dealing with...

Paula Reed  00:53

Exactly.

Joey Reed  00:53

We can sure cope with the stress.

Daren Nair  00:55

People who will never stop working to reunite their families. 

Joey Reed  01:00

We'd like to meet with the President. We believe that, you know, he has... he's surrounded by lots of experienced and educated advisors. But I don't believe that any of them have ever had a child taken hostage by a foreign country, especially not a superpower like Russia.

Daren Nair  01:15

And we will be right there by their side until their loved one comes back home.

Richard Ratcliffe  01:20

Because if enough people care, then the right people will care enough.

Daren Nair  01:24

I'm Daren Nair, and I've been campaigning with many of these families for years. When I first started campaigning with these families, I noticed they struggled to get the media attention they needed. So, I decided to create this podcast, which is a safe space for the families to speak as long as they need to about their loved ones, and what needs to be done to bring them home.

Mariam Claren  01:45

Nobody can prepare you for what our family's going through. Even if someone had told me one year before in one years, this is going to happen, prepare yourself. It's impossible.

Daren Nair  01:59

Thank you for listening, and welcome to Pod Hostage Diplomacy. Welcome to Pod Hostage Diplomacy. Jose Pereira from Houston, Texas, is an innocent American permanent resident, a husband, a father and a grandfather. Jose worked for US Oil Company, Citgo Petroleum, where he was acting president and CEO. In November 2017, shortly before Thanksgiving, Jose was instructed to travel to Venezuela with a few of his American colleagues to attend a business meeting in Caracas. During that meeting in Caracas, Jose and his five other American colleagues were arrested on false charges and wrongfully imprisoned in the country. Collectively, they were known as the Citgo 6. On the 8th of March this year, one of the Citgo 6 members, Gustavo Cadenas, was released and is now back home in the United States with his family. Jose and the other members of the Citgo 6 remained in prison in Venezuela. Earlier this month, on 1st October, almost five years since Jose and his colleagues were arrested, the US government secured the release of seven American citizens wrongfully detained in Venezuela, including Jose himself and the remaining members of the Citgo 6. The following is a statement from US President, Joe Biden, on their release. "Today, after years of being wrongfully detained in Venezuela, we are bringing home Jorge Toledo, Tomeu Vadell, Alirio Zambrano, Jose Luis Zambrano, Jose Pereira, Matthew Heath, and Osman Khan. These individuals will soon be reunited with their families and back in the arms of their loved ones where they belong. I am grateful for the hard work of dedicated public servants across the US government who made this possible, and who continue to deliver on my administration's unflinching commitment to keep faith with Americans held hostage and wrongfully detained all around the world. Today, we celebrate that seven families will be whole once more. To all the families who are still suffering and separated from their loved ones, who are wrongfully detained, know that we remain dedicated to securing their release. It is also a priority of my administration to prevent Americans from having to endure the unimaginable pain of being held hostage or wrongfully detained. This summer, I signed an executive order that will impose new costs, including sanctions and visa bans against the perpetrators of such acts. In addition, the State Department has introduced a new warning indicator, specifically the letter D, that is designed to help Americans understand where and when travel may incur increased risk of wrongful detention, potentially for long periods of time. If travellers make the decision to go despite this D warning, they need to know that they are incurring massive personal risk and that it may not be feasible for the US government to secure their release. That was a statement from US President, Joe Biden. All the families of the Citgo 6 are strong and resilient, and they campaigned tirelessly to reunite their families. We can confirm this ourselves because we interviewed the families of five members of the Citgo 6. In August this year, I had the honour of interviewing Jose 's son, John Pereira. In this interview, John talks at length about his father's arrest, the conditions of his detention, Jose's medical issues including his heart attack and catching COVID-19, his sham trial, as well as what the US government, journalists and the public can do to help. If you want to listen to this interview, you can do so on our website at podhostagediplomacy.com, or wherever you get your podcasts. Today, we get to do something we've never done before. We get to interview a former hostage who we campaigned for while they were in captivity. Today, we have the honour of interviewing Jose Pereira himself, Jose, it is so good to see you. I'm so happy that you're free and back home in the United States reunited with your family. I also know that it's only been a few weeks since your release, and you have now started this long road of recovery, and the wounds are still fresh. So, I'm grateful that you've taken the time to speak to us today to share your story.

Jose Pereira  06:16

Daren, thank you very, very much for having me. And it's quite an honour being with you, because I know you have been doing this so long, taking care of the families and some ex-prisoners that were in jail. And, for me it's an honour that I can talk with you, because now I can talk about my case and try to give kind of a message to the rest of the families that... they have loved ones left behind. So, it's an honour.

Daren Nair  06:48

Thank you very much. And it's an honour to help, I mean, it's one of the most rewarding things I've done in my life. So, it's an honour to help. Okay, so first of all, can you please walk us through what happened from the moment you found out that you were finally going home after almost five years in captivity?

Jose Pereira  07:05

Okay, yes. Before we begin in this... in this, we have to try to give a little bit of this... the story behind this, because, you know, we in December 2021, received the first time the visit of Ambassador Roger Carstens, that is... was appointed by... for the office created for the hostages handed as State SPEHA. So, he... he went to Venezuela in December 2021. And that's the first time we saw him face-to-face. In that moment, we realised that we were very close to be realise, uh, released in any moment. We didn't know when, but we were more... more with hope that it were happening any moment. So, he had a meeting with us, and we knew he had meetings on one-on-one with some Venezuelan officials. And, you know, that... that time, he didn't come with nobody. But he opened that conversation, let's say. He came back three months later in March 2021... 2022, sorry. And, you know, we made him the question if... if he's going to release somebody? He says at the moment was no, but the truth of the matter that that night, he could go back with Gustavo Cardenas. For us, it was the kind of the beginning of what finally happened for the rest of us. It gave us a lot of hope that we were in the process, that the rest of the five could be released soon in any moment. So, he came back on June 2022, let's say three months later. And by that time, you know, Matthew... Matthew Heath, he was having some kind of illness. He was in the hospital. We were aware about that situation, and we realised that maybe he will kind of have some kind of priority, because in that moment, he was ill. But unfortunately, Ambassador Carstens, he came back with his hands empty that day. Was kind of disappointing to our families to tell you the truth. The family got really disappointed and down. And you know, it was kind of funny because the rest of our five, we were kind of with really big hope that... that will be the case that we are releasing any moment. So, we were telling our families, "don't go down, keep... keep... keep... keep doing the hard work because this is going to happen in any moment. And... and then he came October 1, you know, we were that day very early in our cell, and one of the guards came to us and asked us to get properly dressed. And we were kind of laughing because when every time they said "properly dressed." we had to put kind of a yellow outfit. And we call it the Minion outfit. So, we look like Minions, you know, so we were dressing with our Minion outfit. And we saw that big boss of the... of the SEBIN come into our jail, and he said, "no, no, no, no, take out that... that outfit. Put your civil outfit, because you're gonna go home. So, when he said that, my first question to him was, "what that means going home?" because for us was kind of a surprise. And he said to us, "you're gone, you're going to home. You're free." So, in that moment, we were... we realised that something was going on. But, you know, you still kind of sceptical. So, they... they... they... we went to the director's office. So, we saw some doctor there to make some kind of medical test and some kind of paperwork. And after that, we were loaded in a armoured truck. And when the armoured truck began to drive, I saw a sign that said that we were going to the Maiquetia airport. The Maiqueta airport is the airport of Caracas. So, in that moment, we truly realised that we were going back home. So, but that was a kind of a process, because, you know, we went to... to our airplane that was waiting us there. So, there was some guard there. They... they asked us to, you know, that we're going to be tied with handcuff, and they were gonna tie our legs. And they were... were asking to put us some masks. And when... when I said, "I can accept the handcuffs; I can accept the legs, but I'm not gonna use a mask." So, I told like, "I'm not gonna wear a mask, I'm sorry." So, he... he respected that. No mask. He told us that we're going to have a one-and-a-half hour flight. So, we... we were kind of surprised because we said, "where are we going to? One hour and a half, you know, to the US it's five hours. So, we're gonna be in the middle of the Caribbean." We were kind of guessing if we were gonna go to Cuba, you know. So, at the end, we landed in a very tiny island in the Caribbean. It was kind of funny because it's so tiny, that even the, you know, the... the... the... the airplane to land was kind of sketchy, because it was so small, the island. Later on, we realised that it was San Vincent and the Grenadines. So, we landed there, no sign, we didn't... didn't recognise the flag that was there. So, we had to wait. And kind of some minutes after, we saw a bigger plane of the US landing. And we said, "here is our hero." Ambassador Carstens came for us. So, he landed there, and we were instructed, and... and then we were getting off all the handcuff and stuff. And we were instructed to go to the other plane, and, well, the rest is history. We... we went back to the US. When we were entering to the US airspace, the captain came out, and I remember that movie, Argo, at the time, because when that guy said, "hey, welcome into the US airspace, was kind of funny, because everybody was hugging. Everybody was laughing. Everybody was crying. And... and after that, we realised that Mr. Biden was calling our families, giving the big surprise with a call. And... and Ambassador Carstens passed us the phone. I could talk with my wife, when I... before we were landing. And kind of minutes after, we were landing in San Antonio. And, well, there, everybody was waiting us there. Was most emotional moment in my life, see my family there, see my grandson, that I didn't know, coming to me was the best moment I will remember ever. 

Daren Nair  14:02

I can only imagine. But I've... I've had the privilege of seeing some of the photos you've sent me. I mean, it's just amazing. I can only imagine how amazing that must have been for you and for the families. And again, I'm so happy that you're now back home. You were released with, not just your Citgo colleagues, but also with former US Marine, Matthew Heath, and Osman Khan. Was that the first time you met them face-to-face? Or did you bump into them in prison? Or were they held somewhere else?

Jose Pereira  14:35

No. You know, it was kind of funny that the situation because, Matthew, we never met him. But when we saw him come into the plane, because we were following the story of him. His mom was doing a awesome job pushing hard for him. So, we kind of thought that we... we knew this guy. So, when I saw Matthew coming, I said, "hey, you're Matthew." So, it was a privilege knowing him the first time. And he was in, by the way, in the hospital with a guy that was with us when we were in the DGCIM. So, kinda, he knew our history, and we knew about him. So, it was kind of a... was two old buddies that were meeting after a long time. So, yeah, we even... we didn't know him, we knew a lot of him, and we were so glad to see him in that plane. And in the same was with Osman. Osman is a very young guy, a very awesome guy. So, I can tell you, we were so pleased that these guys were coming with us.

Daren Nair  15:38

Yeah. So, I think the... Matthew Heath, sorry, Matthew Heath's family, they posted a photo of the two of them on the plane smiling, and you can see Matthew's face and you saw Osman's face, and they were just very happy. I understand all of you were taken to a Department of Defense medical facility to go through health checks right after you were released, and this was in San Antonio. Can you talk more about this?

Jose Pereira  16:08

Well, basically, first of all, they did an awesome job with us, because they treated us so well. Taking care of all our, you know, our medical things, because one of the things we went through all these five years, either really, our health treatment was very, very poor. In fact, was kind of lack of medical treatment. In my particular case, I had a lot of issues there, from my health point of view, and I kind of survived it, because I take care of my... by my own. So, I was kind of ultimately caring my own, because normally you don't have a doctor treating to you. So, it was so overwhelming seeing these guys, so taking care of us, not only from the physical point of view, they were taking care from the psychological point of view. So, there was a very helpful psychologists, they were helping us with our transition. They call it that, like, the compression process is like the Coca Cola that if you open it so fast, it's... it's blown. If you open it very quietly, it will go in a transition. So, they... they helped us. And even my wife could attend that in some moments. So, I'm really, really glad in what... what the US government did it for us, because once I kind of transition coming to a new normal life, that was really helpful. I have kind of, you know, the first day that I was there, I had to take a shower, and I went to the... to the shower when I saw the hot water. And I was so glad to have that. I stayed like a half hour in the shower. And the nurse came to knock me the door because she... she... she thought something wrong was going on.  And say, "hey, Mr. Pereira, are you good?" "Okay, I'm doing okay." I said I wanted to stay an hour there. But yeah, it was kind of very, very, very awesome, what these guys did to us.

Daren Nair  18:21

How long was it before you actually got to go home? Because like you said, they call it the compression process, right? So, I interviewed Michael White. He's an American citizen, and a US Navy veteran. He was held hostage in Iran for, I believe, around six... six hundred days. And when he came home, he didn't really have a support system. So, it was one of the worst moments of his life. But in your case, obviously you're surrounded by family. How long was it before they actually let you go home? Or did you choose to go home early? Did they give you the option of staying longer?

Jose Pereira  18:58

We were free to stay in that time we realised too, we needed, but all of us decided to stay the time that they decided that would be the right time to us. So, we stayed around 10 days because was really, really hard for me. Let me tell you something. One day, I was talking with one of the doctors, and he made me some... some story about the, you know, when... when the... when the veterans came from World War Two, the difference between that process and the veterans that came from Vietnam, for example, was different, because the veteran that came from World War Two, came by ship. And they went by... by weeks travelling with their colleagues, with their co-workers. And they were talking among them. So, they were, you know, that kind of... kind of a decompression process, a natural decompression process. The veterans that came in... in the Vietnam, they came alone by plane and went directly to their house. So, when they... when they came back to home, that shock between what they had being going through and the shock of their new life was kind of overwhelming. So, you know, you need that decompression process. So, we're really glad they did it to us, because even... even that you think that your'e okay, you begin to realise there are things that you need to handle. So, now... now, I'm fully aware of some situation, because, again, I have five years without seeing my wife, and my kids. And now I... And my pets. You know, I have some pets, that when I... when... when I left, they were very, very young. I have like, two or three months. Now they're five years old. So, everything is new for me. So, I'm kind of relearning that process, okay?

Daren Nair  20:56

Absolutely. And you mentioned your grandson earlier. It was the first time you met him.

Jose Pereira  21:00

Correct. When... when we arrived to San Antonio, I think this is going to be one of the best moment that I'll remember ever. I believe he will also have his memories on that, because we never met. I... I knew him by photos, and he knew me by photo. I learned that day that my... my daughter-in-law was keeping everyday showing photos of me, saying "hey, this is Grandpa. See his face? This is Grandpa." So, what's kind of funny, because when... when they were in the... in the hangar waiting for us, I saw a very tiny guy, you know, running to me and... and... and yelling: "Hey, Grandpa!" I recognised that it was my... my grandson, Lucas. So, he jumped me through to me. And that photo, I have it, and I'm gonna put it in a portrait, a big portrait, because it's so awesome. So, yeah, for me, you know, having met him the first time in that way is going to be something remarkable for the rest of my life.

Daren Nair  22:03

I mean, I'm so happy for the two of you. How are you doing now? And what have you been up to since your release?

Jose Pereira  22:11

Well, I have been going through several process, one as I... as I said, to... to recovery, to, you know, to the new life, what I... what I call the new normal, that to tell you the truth, I still don't know what is going to be my new normal, okay? But one of the things that, you know, I have been thinking, during all the time that I was there in jail, I always thought, "what are gonna you do when you get released?" So, I... I always thought about that moment. And in some point, when I begin to... the first thing that when I begin to understand that there's a lot of... of Americans, they're in a similar situation that has worldwide. For me, was the first was surprising. I was not aware of that... about that situation. I remember that back to, I believe, 2019, our family went to... to a meeting in the... in the White House with a former vice president. And that day, there was a gala of that Foley foundation that they were invited. And that day were invited a lot of families that have beloved ones, kept in, you know, Russia, Iran, China, and, you know, when my wife could tell me about that, because by that point, we were kind of smuggling letters between us, and we can have some kind of communication. And she... she taught me about that. And I tried to begin to investigate... investigate what was going on, is when the first time I realised there are really a lot of people, 50, 60 people that came there. And I said, "hey, you know what, this is something amazing." So... So, I begin to follow more of their stories, and then happen that they begin to a appeals of releases worldwide. We saw, for example, in TV, when... when you was released, some lady of Australia that we saw. Well, I don't want to name that.... that. You know, there was a lady after that was released in UK, UK, and then it happened that release of Trevor in US. So, every time I saw the interviews of them or their family, we found that there was a kind of a pattern because the suffering of the family is always the same. Their families, all of them are always the same pain, it's the same suffering. That is kind of... it's exactly a pattern that... that... that the families and the... and the people, of course, are suffering. So, I said, "you know what, the day I go out, I'm gonna begin to talk among these people, because it's kind of a... you believe that is kind of a mission there that I need." So, that's what I have been doing all these days, I have been doing some kind of interviews and, and every time I'm trying to spread the message, because one of the thing that I really learned is that you need to have hope, you need to have faith, and because this is really the thing that keeps you alive. When you have the hope and the faith, that you're going to come back to your loved ones, and you're going to see them soon, and then you're going to be in a good mood. So, my message to them is that, that don't lose the faith, don't lose the hope. And... and I want to spread the message. So, I have to tell you, I don't know what I'm going to do for my living from now on, but what I'm doing now, I'm feeling kind of glad doing it.

Daren Nair  25:54

That's great. And I also know you have a Twitter account now, and you've been raising awareness of other hostages held around the world, which is amazing. We and their families are very grateful that you're doing this. So, thank you for that. And please do keep on doing that. I also saw your posts on Twitter, where you said, you've been spending time with your grandchildren. Clearly, you're making up for lost time with the family, all the missed birthdays, the anniversaries and life events. What has that been like?

Jose Pereira  26:25

Well, it's something amazing because, for example, I lost that birthday of my kids. I lost the birthday of my grandson, I lost my 60 years birthday. That was in the... in the... in the year before this happened, I always told my wife we have more than 30 years married. And that when I got to the 60 years, we will do a very big party and a cruise. And well, that didn't happen. I was alone in a jail and she sent to me a cake that day, by the way. And I was in the, you know, "what I'm gonna do with cake?" So, I tried to share with my, the people that were there and tried to have, at least, a good moment in my life. But I'm trying to catch up right now, all the time lost. I'm trying to catch up with my grandkids. I'm trying to catch up with my kids and trying to catch... catch up with my wife. And well, this is something that I'm really enjoying. I'm catching up with my pets, also. So... so, I'm really enjoying it. I'm really enjoying it.

Daren Nair  27:31

In the last five years, America and the world has changed in so many ways. I've spoken to many former hostages, and they say when they're being held in captivity, it's like you're frozen in time. Time stands still for you, and yet the rest of the world moves on. What are the changes that have stood out for you, as in what are the changes that you've noticed since you've been home?

Jose Pereira  27:56

Okay, this is something so true, you know. The first time I heard that is when I saw the interview of the lady of Australia. She's Kylie Gilbert-Moore? Okay. I saw an interview they gave to her. And she talked about that. And then I heard that from Nazanin. And then I heard that from Trevor. And I said, "God, this is the same thing we're feeling because is... is you you feel like you're in a time machine. You're in a vessel in a time machine. And in that time is stay still. But the... the... the world is continually evolving and moving. So, when you go back, because we, during all these five years, we had two very small house arrests. The first time I had two months' house arrest in June 2019. When was shocking for me because my mind couldn't realise that two years and a half already has passed. And now that I have five years, sometimes it's kind of I... I... I... my mind doesn't recognise it. I'm still in that process. And the world has changed so much, you know, now, the world... the world is... there are wars, and there are a lot of the pandemic, also, put a lot of sensitivity in the skin of the people. So, I'm kind of learning that. And, by the way, that things simple like a phone, I'm learning how to use it. You know? I... for me, it's very new. You talk about I was in the Twitter. Yes, I opened my Twitter account and I'm learning to use it. I haven't been using it. And so, I'm trying to learning a lot of things. For me, it's another thing that I had to relearn again.

Daren Nair  29:51

I mean that learning never really stops. But you're absolutely right. So, as Dr. Kylie Moore-Gilbert, she was a British-Australian academic, who was held hostage in Iran for about 800 and two, maybe three days. The second person was Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British charity worker from London. So, if you've listened to this podcast before, you know who Nazanin is, because I've interviewed Richard Ratcliffe four or five times. My very first episode was with Richard Ratcliffe, Nazanin's husband, I campaigned with him for almost six years to free his wife, Nazanin. And the third person you mentioned Trevor Reed, the American and former US Marine who was held hostage pretty much in Russia for three years, two-and-a-half years or three years, Joey and Paula Reed, Trevor Reed's parents were the first American family I interviewed. It was my second episode. And again, I'm so happy that he's free. And he was actually taken to that same facility in San Antonio when he returned as well, earlier this year, right? 

Jose Pereira  31:02

Yeah, correct.

Daren Nair  31:03

Have you been in contact with Trevor?

Jose Pereira  31:05

Yeah, we have... we had some, some kind of... some chats, yeah. And, you know, one of the things that I admire all these guys that I'm talking about is that they have been continuing campaigning for... for this. So, they... they inspire you what they're doing, because all of the three persons that I mentioned, I'm following them right now, and know they are very heavy campaigning. And... and I want to do that, because I believe that this is the right thing to do, because, again, these, as you put in your podcast, that the hostage diplomacy is something that people are not aware that is happening, and is happening in... in a lot of countries in the world. And this is something that has to stop. Because you know, you can be a UK citizen, you can be an American citizen, you can be an Australian citizen or Belgian, whatever. And then during... you were with your family, in a family trip, you know, you're tourists in somewhere, taking photos, chilling out, and that day something wrong happen and you find yourself in a jail, and then you stay five or six year, because you have that citizenship. So, that is not good, that... that... that it is happening, and the people who are not aware about the situation. For example, I learned that one of the hostages, and now that we're having a campaign, that I'm gonna tell... talk later on, is this guy of Rwanda, Paul Rusesabagina. I am a movie lover, and I enjoyed the "Hotel Rwanda" movie with my wife a lot of years ago, I admire that guy, and then knowing that he's kept in jail, for me was a shock the day I learned about it. And now that his family is in the campaign, his daughter. So for me, something means something that everybody's pushing in the same direction to get their people released. So, people need to know about this. So, I want to raise the awareness of this,

Daren Nair  33:17

Thank you very much for doing that. We could use all the help we can get, because, as I say, in my interviews, hostage diplomacy doesn't happen to everyone, but it can happen to anyone.

Jose Pereira  33:31

Correct.

Daren Nair  33:32

 And that's why... it's one of the reasons why I created this podcast. And I interview people from all around the world, to show that this is not just an American problem, it's not just a British problem. It is not just an Australian problem, or French or German problem. It's a problem that affects many countries around the world. And you're going to need an international coalition to tackle this issue. And how we do that, that's... that's still something very smart people in positions of power need to get to that... need to get together and talk about. And what I'm trying to do is just raise awareness, educate the voters about this issue and how it can affect them, and get them to write to their Members of Parliament, their Senators, their Congressmen, and say that this is something people want you to fix. And that's kind of the objective of this podcast. I saw your other posts on Twitter, where you said you attended your first church service in five years. I interviewed the families of five of the Citgo 6, and many of them said they look to religion to find solace, to find the strength, to cope with this ongoing trauma. Was that what you did? And what other ways did you use to find the strength to carry on? 

Jose Pereira  34:54

Well, definite, the answer is yes. One of the things that we learn during all these process is that you need to come back to God, whatever you believe, because I understand that you can believe in maybe another presence, but... but you need to go back to God. Because, why? Because sometimes you... you forgot about this. And you know, when... and... and I always talk about my past life, in my past life, I remember that sometimes I was driving to home, or driving to my job, I was always busy. And you know, I saw that there was a, like, a Bible. It's still the same. I said, "why the people are doing that, wasting their time doing that?" Well, let me tell you, at the end, we were doing kind of Bible studies every day in... during our stay in the jail, because we're having episode that happened to us, that I am always talking about it, because I believe it was a magical episode, okay? While we were there in the...  in the... in the jail of the DGCIM, it's a military installation. We were in a basement that is like a two or three, four floors in the basement. And you know, by that time, we didn't have access to no books. There was no TV, no radio, no, no nothing. And... and we were kind of all the day doing nothing, only thinking and thinking and thinking. And one day, one guy could smuggle a small pocket Bible. And he told, "hey, I have a pocket Bible." So, we begin to read that small, very, very small Bible with candles. And then after that, we begin to read it, you know, we begin to have some kind of relief, reading the Bible, but we did everything in a very quiet way, because we have the cameras. They could see you there. And one day, one of the guards came in and saw us reading, and we thought this guy is going to punish us. And... and then, but the guy, we learned that his family was religious. So, the guy came to us and said, "no, no, no, continue doing, you're doing good." And the other day, he brought us a... a... a praying Bible, a big Bible. He said, "take the Bible, take the real Bible." And we begin to read the Bible. And in that project, continuing continuing, continuing, and then people begin to go more to us. But in... by that time, we were around 150 people there. And from those 150 people, almost a third begin to read the Bible with us. So, now we were like 50 people reading the Bible. And it became like a church. And... and that was kind of magical momentum, because really, you... you felt the presence of God. That thing made us, all of us, begin to read the Bible. Every night, we begin to study the Bible, you know, the... the Old Testament, the New Testament, and we, you know, it was a daily, daily thing we were doing. And they gave... gave us a lot of relief. I can tell you that every night we did that, and we slept in peace. So, what... When we were released, and I came back from San Antonio, the first thing I did that weekend was go to the church, and I went to a church, then... then my daughter-in-law was assistant. And it was a magical moment also, because it's a very big church... church with one thousand people, very big, very big. And you know, I saw they're playing music. It was so amazing the moment and the... and the priest, he was aware about our situation, because my daughter-in-law had told him. And that guy came, and he hugged us and, you know, I felt like I was like, as you know, the Holy Spirit was coming to me. It was so relief, and I said, "this is something that you have to be aware," and I think that everybody that is going through a situation like this, or... or anything that... It's not that you have to go to God, because you're having a bad moment, it's because you always have to go to God. So, I believe that this this is something that we learn there. And we will continue doing it, because it's something that gave us a lot of relief. 

Daren Nair  39:45

I'm glad, and you're not the first former hostage to say so. In my last episode, I interviewed American humanitarian, Aya Hijazi, who was wrongfully imprisoned in Egypt for three years She said one of the things that got her through her captivity was religion, and spirituality. So, it's something I see quite often with former hostages, even Nazanin, when she was held in prison in Iran, she looked to religion as well, to find hope. So yeah, it's... it's quite common., and I'm glad you're gonna continue it.

Jose Pereira  40:26

No, because I want to point out that... that even the religion, when in some point, we had the opportunity to... we were allowed to bring books. And most of the people that were getting in that facility, unfortunately, are political prisoners and they are, we knew are kind of clever guys, you know, high ranking political prisoners. And... and they, when they were allowed to bring book, we read a lot of very interesting books that maybe most of them, to tell you the truth, maybe I will never read them in... in my life, if I were not been there to have the time to read them. So, one of the books that kind of marked me was a book, that is called Man in Searching of Meaning, that it's a guy that he was a Jew, Viktor Frankl. I... I was not aware about that book, okay? Well, the first time I saw about it, maybe you have it there, no? Okay, you're looking at it. Well, let me tell you, for me, okay, there's a... This is the... the book, "Man's Searching for a Meaning." I can tell you everybody in his life has to read that book. But, you know, reading it in the jail has something more amazing, because you can understand that why that guy could survive. And that is the answer, why you can survive, if you look for a meaning of your life. And when... and when we realised that the meaning to survive was our family, that we needed to be good in soul and body and spirit for a family that made a lot. It was a boost in our life. So, that book, everybody has to read it, so I am glad that I could read that book in jail, because for me, meant... meant something.

Daren Nair  42:22

The reason I bought this, this arrived, like three days ago, and I bought this because you mentioned this. 

Jose Pereira  42:28

No kidding. Are you kidding? Ah, you bought it!

Daren Nair  42:29

No, I'm serious. 

Jose Pereira  42:30

Have you read it? Okay, correct.

Daren Nair  42:31

I bought this because you've been tweeting, you've been tweeting quotes about this...  ...on your Twitter feed. And you... you mentioned... you mentioned it in interviews. So, I decided, okay, I'm gonna buy this, and I haven't read it yet. I have read parts of it. And I've definitely seen, like the quotes you've been tweeting, so yeah, it's a very good book.

Jose Pereira  42:52

That book, let me tell you... 

Daren Nair  42:53

Thank you. Thank you for that. 

Jose Pereira  42:54

A little heads up on the book. This guy, Viktor Frankl, he was... he was from Austria, okay, and he was the head of a psych... psych... psychiatry hospital, he was psychiatrist. Okay. And he was developing a theory that is now called logotherapy. Okay, logotherapy is a therapy meaning that when you have logos, Logos in Latin is meaning. So, but he couldn't finish because he was kept to... he was sent to the concentration camp with his family. But he realised there that the people that survive was because they had a meaning in their life. Because they were always thinking, I have to go back to my family. I have to go back to my life, to my wife, to whatever. The people that lost the meaning, they died. They're frozen, they appear in the night, dead, they pass away. So that guy, after he went from jail, he concluded his story. And now is that famous logotherapy theory. So, it's amazing. That book is amazing, I can tell. It's amazing. Everybody should read it. 

Daren Nair  44:12

Yeah. So, for our listeners, the book's title is "Man's Search for Meaning, the Classic Tribute to Hope from the Holocaust." The author is Viktor E Frankl. So, please do buy this book. They don't sponsor us, but you know. [Laughter] All right. And yeah, so no, genuinely, it's a great book. And, like I said, I interviewed Aya Hijazi last week, and she mentioned that she was reading Maya Angelou, and it gave her a similar kind of inspiration. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, Jose, I interviewed your son, John, in August. We discussed at length, your arrest, the conditions of your detention, your medical issues, including your heart attack and catching COVID, your sham trial as well as what the US government, journalists and the public can do to help. I know the wounds are still fresh, but would you like to walk us through what happened from your perspective?

Jose Pereira  45:12

In our case? Well, unfortunately, in our case, we were kept... we were kept in the middle of... of a political situation that we didn't have absolutely nothing to do. Because when... when we... when we get caught, that situation between Venezuela and the US was kind of bad, it was a lot of sanctions that were going in place. And when they realised that the... the team were Americans, so they say, "hey, now we have these guys here." So, they begin from day... kind of from day one, to... to see what they can do with us. But when things become to get worse, because in 2018, that the US Embassy in Venezuela was expelled. So, the relation was totally broken, there was no communication and... and the sanctions continued going. They become to be personal sanctions, sanctions to US-Venezuelan companies, banks, you know, ministry, whatever. And the thing... and then in 2019, erupted, opposition leader. That... that, you know, so it was a kind of a big dispute between Venezuela and US, and we were caught in the middle. We were in a kind of a perfect storm. And we were like a puppet or a pet in a cage, and we were like, you know, caught in the middle of everything. Every time the thing when worst, it went worst to us. And... and when... when the US decided to go and talk directly to these guys, because of us, and I... I... I will have always the gratitude to Ambassador Carstens and his wonderful team in our own SPEHA, because this is something that... that is not of politics, because one of the things that always happens if you get caught in a middle of politics, in something that you don't have absolutely nothing to do, because we are not politic, we don't have absolutely nothing to do with that. So, you say, "why I'm suffering this; why I'm going through this; why I have to do with this?" But if that is the situation, so, my... my recommendation in... for the future, for any government, is put beside the politics when there is a hostage case, is... is kind of have the moral courage, take the right decisions to bring the people back, but not... don't try to play politics with... with them, because I have heard that in other cases, that has been the case. They have been caught in the same in the middle of political... political issues.

Daren Nair  48:12

So, Jose, you touched on a very important point when you mentioned governments should not play politics, and innocent people should not be caught in the middle of this. Now, the US government passed the Robert Levinson Hostage Recovery and Hostage-taking Accountability Act a few years ago. It's named after Robert Levinson, who is an American citizen who was held hostage in Iran and has now been presumed dead. I believe he was taken over a decade ago, and unfort... sadly, he's been presumed dead. So, in the wake of this campaigners, including his family, the James Foley Legacy Foundation, have lobbied Congress to create a law that helps bring home Americans wrongfully detained and held hostage overseas. It prioritises... it gives... it gives the government power. It prioritises this issue. And as per my understanding, this applies to both American citizens and lawful permanent residents. 

Jose Pereira  49:18

Correct. 

Daren Nair  49:19

However, it appears that it is much harder to be classified as wrongfully detained if you're a US permanent resident as opposed to a citizen. An example here will be US lawful permanent resident, Shahab Dalili, from Virginia, who has been held hostage in Iran since April 2016. He is not the only American currently held hostage in Iran. American citizens, Siamak Namazi, Morad Tahbaz and Emad Shargi, are also being held hostage in Iran. However, Siamak, Morad and Emad have been classified as wrongfully detained by the US government. But Shahab has not, even though the circumstances of his arrest was similar to the others. What are your thoughts on this, given that you yourself are a lawful permanent resident in the United States and not yet an American citizen?

Jose Pereira  50:08

Okay, there's a very, very good question there, Daren, because, first of all, when the Levinson Act was approved, that was a good, very good start, let's... let's put it from there. It was a very good start, because, now you have, like a kind of a procedure, how to handle when the hostages case come, and how to handle people to be classified as wrongfully detained. This is like kind of an overall first step, but more has to be done. For example, recently, as you mentioned, that the executive order was issued, I believe that was part of the pressure that had been going to the government for that, but there is still more to have be done... doing, because you mentioned, for example, the... the case of this permanent resident. Dalili, is his name?

Daren Nair  50:59

Yes. It's Shahab Dalili.

Jose Pereira  51:01

Dalili. Okay. Well, to tell...

Daren Nair  51:02

Shahab Dalili is from Virginia. 

Jose Pereira  51:05

Yeah, I don't know what... what is his case. In our particular case, as you said, we were six, five were citizens, I was a permanent resident, in the process to become a citizen. But, you know, our case was so clear, so clear, that it was a sham trial, that when we decided to... to proceed with the government to submit all the paperwork for being classified as wrongfully detained, in that case, clearly it was considered like that. But, said that, the process sometimes takes too long, because when... when the person he's get caught as a hostage, from diplomacy, sometimes it takes too long. Sometimes it can take years, and that should be expedited. Because that, again, the person doesn't have the fault that you get caught in the middle of some political thing. So, the first thing that the government should do is... is... is protect that person. And this is something that should happen worldwide, because the US is doing it right, is doing it properly. But I believe the other countries like UK, like Australia, Belgium, France, whatever, should do the same. So, you mentioned earlier that this should be something... something more worldwide. I believe this should be something at the level of the UN. They should be a kind of Levinson Act at the level of the UN, because the Levinson Act created the States' SPEHA office that, as I said, and I can say that clearly here, that is amazing team. Ambassador Carstens and all his team are amazing, A with a very big A, Amazing. By the way, I call Ambassador Carstens, Captain America, because he's Roger, you know, he's... he's Captain America for me. So, he's doing so great, that we need more, more, more Roger Carstens worldwide. Should be more Carstens in the UK. It should be more. So, it should be even at the level of UN. So, these see what is happening, and I think one of the things, that for me, is raising the message, making the pressure. Things like that bring our family home. Campaigners are making this more visible. And... but there is more things to do ... to be done. For example, that things like the Richardson Foundation, or the Foley Foundation, or the Amer Fakhoury Foundation, there are... there are Hostage... Hostages USA, Hostages Worldwide. There are several foundations. They are doing so amazing job, but the people are not aware. The people are not aware. I can tell you, Daren, after this happened, I were contacted by Hostages USA, US, the NGO that is taking care of post traumatic events. And they are doing so awesome, I'm overwhelmed at the help I've received from them. They are calling me two, three times in a day, how I'm taking care of my thing, because one of the things that nobody realised that once you come back, you have a lot of issues that you have left behind, because you say that... the world continues. So, then you have financial issues, tax issues, billing whatever. So... So, is like a shocking moment that you receive in this moment, because you realise that you... the life continues, and you have to catch up with life. So, this is part of the help the organisation was doing. I'm kind of so overwhelmed on what they are doing, because these are people that, like you, are advocating for the people that have been kept hostage, and that these should be more visible, that people are not aware of the situation that they are not aware about all the good job that all these organisations are doing, and... and, well, in the... in the way that I can spread the message, I'm gonna do it. I really am gonna do it. 

Daren Nair  55:32

Absolutely. And again, it goes back to the fact that hostage diplomacy doesn't happen to everyone, but it can happen to anyone. If this was something... if hostage diplomacy, and hostage taking was a lot more common, many more people would be aware of this. But the thing is, most people, most members of the public think, "well, this is something that's not going to happen to me, or very unlikely to happen to me, or I'm not going to travel to these dangerous countries, or these countries that have adversarial relationships with my home country, so I will be safe." But again, that doesn't necessarily mean it won't happen to them. But yeah, you're absolutely right. They deserve a lot more publicity. Hostage US has done phenomenal work not just for returning hostages, but for the families of current hostages. So, I think, when I interviewed Alexandra Zambrano Forseth, Alirio Zambrano's daughter and Jose Luis's niece, she said that Hostage US helped her sister with a mortgage for a house or something. But they... they... they do help families of hostages while they're in captivity as well.

Jose Pereira  56:48

No, no, no, no, I wanted to emphasise that that is totally true. And I'm... I'm... I'm a proof of that, because they're taking of me so hard. They are pushing me so hard that I feel kind of overwhelmed. How they are doing it, in that case that I receive calls two, three days, two or three times in a day. "Hey, how are you doing, Jose? Are you taking care of this? So, they're on top of everything. They're doing so good job that... that... Again, I was not aware that these NGOs and these institutions were doing so as a job, institutions like the Foley Foundation. Can you imagine when I talk to the people who said that...that... that Mrs Diane Foley, that is a wonderful lady, did what she did after what happened with... with her son is something amazing. Things like... like what Richardson... Bill Richardson and Mickey Bergman are doing, advocating, because they believe in them. Period. They believe... they believe, and they do it because they feel it. They mean it. The Fakhoury Foundation. You... you are doing... So, the people that are doing this thing are doing it because they believe. They believe they're doing things that can change the world and so... so, it's amazing. I am kind of happy in some way that because you're part of a family that maybe you didn't want to be, but now that... that... that the life and God put you in that position, now you're happy that you know these guys. So, I have met people that maybe in other situations, I will have never met. And now I know there are so awesome people because of the situation I went through. So, you know, that is part of a meaning of a life.

Daren Nair  58:43

I had the honour of interviewing Diane Foley earlier this year. You're absolutely right. What she's done is incredible, given the murder of her son, eldest child, James Foley. Yeah, they do the James W Foley Legacy Foundation do incredible work. Another thing that one of the family members of a current hostage has mentioned is the US government's approach of bringing some people home, but not everyone home. Like, earlier this year, before they brought you home, they brought your colleague, Gustavo Cardenas, home. They didn't bring all the Citgo 6 members home. They brought Trevor Reed home from Russia, but they didn't bring Paul Whelan and Brittney Griner home. And this kind of approach where they are taking some... They're bringing some American citizens held hostage overseas back home, but not all of them, in itself causes problems. So, I believe it was Elizabeth Whelan that posted a tweet on Twitter about this, saying this is what happens when the government doesn't bring everyone home at the same time. What do you think the government should do? And for people who aren't aware of what it was like being left behind, can you talk about the... the moment you found out that Gustavo Cardenas, your colleague was being released? Now, don't get me wrong, I understand you, every single one of you, were so happy for him, right? There was no doubt in anyone's mind, he deserved to be released. But what was it like for you, for the rest of you, watching him go home, knowing... while, at the same time, knowing that you are left behind?

Jose Pereira  1:00:26

You know, the're... the're two mix feelings, because one is the... the joy of the moment that your colleague is being released. And, of course, the other is the, you know, you feel it is going to happen to me, or I'm going to be left behind. Okay, in that particular case, when Gustavo was released, I had the honour to be there, because when... when, you know, we were in that moment, only with him, Tomeu and me. We were looking, by the way, at a soccer match, you know. We were big fans of soccer, we were look... I don't remember which match was Real Madrid or whatever. So, Gustavo was called to a meeting in the Director's office and few minutes after, he came kind of in shock. And when... when he told us, "I'm gonna go," so, for us was like, wow! That was a good wow, because we knew about he was so needed to go because his son so, for us, was "Gustavo, go." And let me tell you, nobody complained about that, none of us, none of our families. Everybody was really happy. But of course, at the same time, our family was kind of, "when is it going to happen to our dads..." in my particular case, I can tell you, I never lose the hope. Never. Absolutely never. I always told my wife, you know what? Because she will be going totally down, thinking that I could be left behind. And when we saw the case, for example of this Whelan, about his brother, and the pain that happened that they brought Trevor it Trevor himself was kind of feeling pity and the situation Gustavo, the same. I know that he... he told our family that he feeled kind of guilty. He didn't have no, no, no, no reason to be guilty, because, you know, it could have been me, you can be another of the guys. But the truth of the matter is that we never lose hope. And I will always told my wife that "be confident that we are... we're gonna come together." And it happened. And let me tell you, the moment I was flying, my thought was for the other guys that were left behind there, because remember, the're other Americans, they're still left behind. And two of them, there is Luke and Airan, they were in the cell beside us. They were neighbours. We saw them in the patio, almost every day, and we we always talk with them, talk about books, music, whatever, and their family, talk about their friends, their girlfriends, their wife, their kids, their moms. So, when I was flying, I was thinking in them. I was thinking in them. So, one of the things, of course, has to be done better, I know that Ambassador Carstens is doing the best he can do. But you know, it's kind of difficult for people if there is an opportunity to bring the people, they have to bring everybody. So, if you have the chance, you have to take it. In the case of Gustavo, you know, I remember that when it happened, my son told me, he said, "you know that Gustavo became the pizza." And I say, "what is the pizza?" He said, "Dad, when you see the movies, that somebody... somebody takes in the bank, hostages, some days after, this... this guy's hungry, and he goes to the police and says, "I'm hungry, bring me a pizza." And then the police say, "I will give you a pizza, but give me one hostage." So, that's what happened with Gustavo. They were hungry and they gave him a pizza. So, we knew that. But for us, that was a momentum that was happening. He became the pizza and, after that we will go, and that happened. I never lose the hope that it will happen, and we are back. So, for the people that are left behind, my message is that I know the US government and Ambasador Carstens is working hard to bring them back. And part of that campaign that maybe we will talk later. If part of that is time. Try to make some kind of pressure that happen as soon as possible to bring the people back

Daren Nair  1:05:00

Absolutely. And for our listeners, Jose has mentioned Ambassador Carstens and SPEHA multiple times. If you've not listened to our podcast before, SPEHA is an acronym that stands for Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs. And Ambassador Roger Carstens is... is the Special Envoy, and he leads a team, an amazing team that works to bring Americans held hostage and wrongfully detained abroad back home. What else Jose, should the US government be doing better?

Jose Pereira  1:05:35

Well, one... one thing, as I said, is cut the bureaucracy and try to speed up making the classification of wrongfully detained. There's one other thing, the Foley Foundation submitted to his annual report. And one of the things that I read there is that they should give more leverage to the SPEHA team. That means that even they do an awesome job, they have some limitation, because according to the law, whatever, they should have a more leverage, from the budgeting point of view, from the access to that direct access to them, most top officials of the US, because one of the things we learn in during this process is that sometimes there are some kind of roadblocks in... in the administration, that if you could have that direct access, you could avoid those roadblocks. I remember that the kind of the second time that Roger went there, you know, we will see came to be all the life executive of oil all we were planning and making project planning that type of stuff. We told him, "why don't you do a project planning with milestones? You know, it will be a good way to handle this." Because, again, the roadblocks sometimes is what makes this decision to be... it take longer and longer and longer. And longer it takes it is... it becomes more difficult. And the other thing is put the politics aside. This is something that should be not treated as politics. And this is something that this administration of the US is doing good. They have made the moral courage to take the politics aside. It is something that had to be very clear. This is not nothing related to politics. This is something related to human lives that deserve to be brought back to their families.

Daren Nair  1:07:41

You bring up a good point: access to the decision-makers within the US government and the roadblocks that are in place. This is absolutely right. So, what... and that's not just in the United States it happens in... in the UK in other countries as well. So, what the families of hostages and wrongful... wrongfully detained individuals abroad tend to do is they go straight to the media...

Jose Pereira  1:08:05

Correct. 

Daren Nair  1:08:06

And then that bypasses these roadblocks. So, they go to the media, and they get attention from a lot more people, including decision-makers. So, if... if the government gave them more attention, and more access, then the families wouldn't have to go to the media to... to then complain about this, about not getting access, about saying the government is not prioritising this. I interviewed Elizabeth Whelan, Paul Whelan's sister. Paul Whelan is an American and former US Marine currently held in Russia, alongside Brittney Griner. And she mentioned that transparency is very important, a lot more transparency is needed from the government to... to reassure the families that everything is being done to bring their loved ones home. And that's what... that's what's lacking, not the fact that they're not doing everything possible to bring their loved ones home, but that transparency and sharing that information with the families, and that's definitely what needs to be changed. Now, when it comes to journalists and the media, obviously, they're very important in kind of reminding people, raising awareness of hostage diplomacy, reminding people that we have these innocent Americans wrongfully detained or held hostage overseas. And many journalists have reported on the Citgo 6, maybe not all of them, maybe not enough, but there were definitely journalists that were reporting on the Citgo 6. What can journalists do to help?

Jose Pereira  1:09:43

You know, the media is so important and one of the things that, for me, is a kind of a lesson learned all this process is, to all the family. This is a message to all the families that have some... somebody left behind and... and, in some cases, if they are in the unfortunate situation they are kept in prison, don't keep silent. The people have to go to the medias as soon as possible, because one of the things that happens, sometimes, is the first approach is, "don't say nothing, keep silent, keep quiet, we going to handle behind the door, you know." So, that was the situation for us the first year. We kept almost one, our families, I'm sorry, we kept like, one year silent, because we, by that time, we were instructed to keep silent. One year passed; nothing happened. Nobody was taking care of us. So, one day, we meet among ourselves, because we were always like, having kind of a board meeting the six of us, brainstorming things. And we said, "you know what, we have to go to the media and in our family, it was kind of a bizarre thing, because we were thinking the thing. And when we went to the family, they were very sold on that. They always were above us. We thought we were doing a thing and they already were doing it. So, they were thinking to go to the media. So, when they begin to go to the media, almost one year after that our situation begin to be raised up. By the way, the Citgo 6 name appear in that moment, when we begin to go to the media. The media were very good support. They became very good support, the media. One of the things that I answer "yes" to the media, and I have been hearing from other people is when they refer to the cases, sometimes they put those titles, that doesn't mean absolutely nothing, whatever the case is going through. Sometimes the media said that Citgo 6 that were kept by... by corruption in the government. That was a sham trial. Everybody knew that. So, why they put in that as a title, maybe because they want to sell the news. So, the media should be more clear when they... when they refer to the hostages, because everybody knows that the people that is taken hostages, why they're taken. So, don't... don't promote the news in the wrong way. This is a recommendation to the media. Sometimes I believe they do it is because they want to sell. I have seen cases like Brittney, when they refer to her. Come on, she's kept because she's American period, nothing more. So... so, that is a recommendation but even said that I... I really am glad that there are some media that have been very supportive in our case, and can be helpful for the future for other families that are going through this process. But that is my recommendation.

Daren Nair  1:13:03

I absolutely agree with you on that. And I've said that many times my... on this podcast. What the media does is, in some cases like Russia, Iran, and even Venezuela, they repeat Venezuelan state media's propaganda. 

Jose Pereira  1:13:19

Correct.

Daren Nair  1:13:20

They repeat the government propaganda, and it's meant to tarnish your reputation, to make you look guilty.

Jose Pereira  1:13:26

Correct.

Daren Nair  1:13:27

So, when they say six oil executives are guilty of corruption, or whatever false charge they put you in jail for, it... you're doing the work of the Venezuelan Government for them. You are taking this... you are making this innocent person look guilty, even though they're innocent. Maybe... maybe some of them are doing it because of the headlines, to sell newspapers, to get some clicks. I do think some others... some other journalists do it because they feel well, "we don't want to appear biassed. We want to just report what the government says." But the problem is you need to do some investigative journalism. You need to understand you need to go do some research. Focus on the truth, not balance. And that's the problem. You can't... it's not just enough to say what the family say and then what the... what this foreign government says. Do your research. Look for the truth. I understand you don't want to appear biassed as a journalist but focus on the truth. Because when you just... when you just copy and paste the headline that this foreign government, I mean, when it... when you just use this false charge in that headline when you're referring to this American citizen, this innocent citizen, you're making things a lot worse for them. So yeah, I totally agree with you on that one. Now, what can the American public do to help? And not just the American public, people around the world, because you know, with social media, the internet, even if you're not... There were many people campaigning for your release who were not American. I'm not American. So, I'm a member of the public. And I can raise awareness. I've been raising awareness of your case. So what can members of the public do to help?

Jose Pereira  1:15:23

Be... be... be... be more involved, because, again, as I said previously, many people are not aware about this situation. I don't know if it's because they don't get the message or really, they don't care. Because sometimes people are kind of, "that is not my problem. I don't want to hear about it. I have enough problem right now in my life to have additional problems." And okay, that is fair. Maybe that's fair that people, because it's a way they protect themselves. But that... but that... that is wrong, that is wrong, because you said it several times today, you never know when it's going to happen to you. Because I can tell you, not even in my worst nightmare, I never, never in my life thought that something like this could happen to me. You know, I was a guy that I have more than 30 years been working in the oil industry without no failure, a successful career all my life. I never thought... I never had even a transit ticket. So, I was a guy that I never thought that something wrong could happen to me. And then it happened this thing, and my first thing is why this is happening to me? What is happening to the other guys that, by the way, the other five guys that was with me, the Citgo 6, all of us are in... were in the same situation, we're six guys with long term working in the oil industry, with a successful career, with good families, a long term marriage, and having no issue in their life. So, all we saw, why we six are in this situation, that can happen to anybody? So, one of the awareness is that people should be really more conscious about this. You know, I don't mean that, that people had to begin to be advocating, like a belt that people should raise their voices, they should go to their constituents, they should begin to make pressure to take more care on this. Because if nobody, if nobody makes pressure on this, the people are left behind. I have been hearing some cases that people are left behind in China, for example, that... that in Syria, you know. And when I see those cases, to tell you the truth that struck my heart, when I hear the family of this guy's saying that they're left alone, that... that shouldn't be happening. So... So again, one of the things that the people have to do better is, is put more pressure in government officials to take more care on the situation, because sometimes it's matter of taking care.

Daren Nair  1:18:25

I absolutely agree with you. If it's not on the tip of their constituents' tongues, politicians tend not to pay attention. Again, as you said earlier, there are so many things going on right now. There's wars, there's pandemics, there's inflation, there's elections. So many things going on, and most politicians tend to govern by firefighting.

Jose Pereira  1:18:48

Correct.

Daren Nair  1:18:49

So, and unfortunately, what that means is the loudest voices in the room tend to be answered first.

Jose Pereira  1:18:57

Correct.

Daren Nair  1:18:58

And yeah. So, that's what you can do as a member of the public, keep raising awareness of hostage diplomacy, keep raising awareness of cases of Americans, Brits, of French nationals, anyone wrongfully detained abroad, held hostage abroad. Now, Jose, in my last episode, I interviewed Aya Hijazi. As I mentioned, she's an American citizen and humanitarian who was wrongfully imprisoned in Egypt for three years. She told me that even though you leave prison, prison never leaves you. One of the most important things she recommends returning hostages do is ensure they have access to psychological care. Now, I know you mentioned that when you were in San Antonio, they had this compression period and you got your... you had access to people that provided you with psychological care. Do you feel that you need this type of care going forward? And if so, have you been able to get access to it?

Jose Pereira  1:19:59

Yes, yeah, the quick answer is yes, because, yeah, definitely, the people want when he is freed need psychological help, not only him, all his family, because one of the processes that... that... that maybe the people doesn't realise is that the family goes through so... so much pain in the family is so, so much pain, the suffering, because sometimes I believe that the family suffers much more than the prisoner. Because when you're in the prison, you know that that is the situation, you know that you're there, you know, what is happening to you. And you kind of need to know how to manage it, and survive it. And you do and you... you are there. But your family is always behind, suffering. I remember when we were in San Antonio, I heard from one of the kids of our colleagues, and my kids, that they were... they were saying that they were invited to a party, they decided not to go because they were thinking, "what is my dad eating now?" They were going to go to a marriage, they decided not to go. They were invited to a dinner, they decided not to go. So, their life became sad, became to be in pause because of us. So, I can tell you, in my case, my particular case, my kids, now I have so much relief. So, you know, it's kind of a new start for them. So, of course, you need some... some... some psychological help. If you think even that you feel that you are okay, you need it, because you need to restart your life, you put it... your clock is zero, and you're beginning back. So, it will happen to you, it will happen to your family. So, my recommendation, and my strongly recommendation is of course, they have to take care of you. And as I said, calls to the USA and in all the organisation there is even in San Antonio, has been taken of us so much. I will continue doing it. I will continue doing it because I truly believe that it will help us. Yes.

Daren Nair  1:22:21

Jose, what recommendations would you give the families with loved ones still held hostage around the world? I know you mentioned psychological care. I know you mentioned, "don't give up hope." What other recommendations would you give them?

Jose Pereira  1:22:33

Well, one of the things that I strongly recommending to the families is that "stick together," because one of the things that we learned is that when... when... when our families, when our kids decided to campaign together, that made kind of a boost in the situation, you know, that... that not all but almost all the... most of the family got together and created a Bring Our Family Home campaign. They did awesome job. They're wonderful people working behind them, even some of them have been helping them from the communication strategy, these type of things, have been working pro bono there. And when... when... when we realised that we were having families that had people kept in Iran, in China, in Russia, in Afghanistan, Venezuela, and you know, other countries, Myanmar, whatever. So and, it became like, kind of the family that you really don't want to be part. But at the end, you become part of that family. And working together makes things more strong. So, when they decided to unveil the mural in Georgetown, that was something amazing, making that happen. When they did the projection of the image in the building in New York, during the UN General Assembly, that was amazing. When they did, last week, that Welcome Home event in Georgetown, that was amazing. So, they have been doing amazing things. And you know why? Because even that individually, there have been some individual interviews of the family in medias or even being received by the Presidency. Every time, everybody's talking collectively, they talk about their case, but they're talking collectively, they're talking among the rest of them. So, my recommendation is continue doing it and not only continue doing it, bring more people to the campaign, because there are some people that decided to keep quiet, decided to, for some reason, decided not to be part of that campaign. But I recommend that people do it, even the person that are released. Of course, they're gonna go to their normal life, maybe they're not gonna be 100% available, but give some part-time to the campaign. Like, like, you're doing some kind of social thing. So... so, the point is that they stick together, and of course, never lose the hope, never lose the faith, because sometimes I understand that people can get down, that people didn't have now their family. That's always why they didn't come when they're gonna come. Or in other country, they say, "okay, now I often I'm glad that I have been receiving messages from the people saying, hey, "I'm glad you are back, when is going to happen to my family?" That is a very compelling question. Because you... you... you can put... you have to put in the foot of that person, they had their family that are waiting to receive them. For example, I'm gonna say here, I remember the during the event, during the weekend, that was the awesome event, the Welcome Home event in Georgetown, in the afternoon happened, the fire in the... in the prison in Iran. And something that was beautiful in few hours became a nightmare, because you didn't know what... what your family was going through. So, this is kind of a roller coaster. And the... the only way that you can go through it is sticking together, helping among each other. And of course, never losing the hope that they're going to be brought back soon. Are we thinking in that then they will appear? In the moment? They don't know, like it happened to us. So we're a proof. We're here that you can come back.

Daren Nair  1:27:10

That's great advice. Jose, we're almost at the end of our interview. Is there anything else you'd like to mention?

Jose Pereira  1:27:16

Well, for me, first of all, it's a pleasure that you gave me this opportunity, because it's the opportunity to try to give my message to the... to the people that have family, that are still there, try to raise the awareness to the people that doesn't have family, but you will never know when this can happen to you, or can happen to somebody near to you. And I know that there are a lot of things going on, but people should be more aware about this situation. And I want to give that clear message to the... to... for the family that were left in Venezuela. And the family, they're in a worldwide that they should stick together, continue campaigning and working hard to bring their... their family home. I think that this has marked a path. Every time that people are brought back is kind of a learning process, how to handle these types of things. And It marks a path, because when we were brought, we were seven from Venezuela, one from Afghanistan and one from Iran, were nine guys that came back. It was a block of people that came back. And so, I think this is gonna... there's more awareness. I believe that again, the team known as State SPEHA is doing so awesome, that they're doing an amazing job behind the scenes. And we're gonna continue looking people coming very soon. So, I'm really thinking on that; I'm thinking on them. And I'm thinking that I will continue advocating to help them as as much as I can, in my position. So, thank you very much for having me here.

Daren Nair  1:29:06

You're very welcome, Jose, and I can't say this enough. I'm so happy that you're free and back home with your family. I'm grateful for the US government and everyone else that helped bring you home. I'm grateful that you're continuing to campaign for other hostages around the world. Thank you for taking the time to speak to us today.

Jose Pereira  1:29:23

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Daren Nair  1:29:29

Thank you for listening to Pod Hostage Diplomacy. Thank you for giving your time and for showing these families that they're not alone, that there are good, caring people out there willing to stand by their side and help in any way possible.

Richard Ratcliffe  1:29:44

Because if enough people care then the right people will care enough. This is a basic rule of thumb is true for all campaigning.

Daren Nair  1:29:52

If you haven't already, please subscribe to our fortnightly newsletter called The Hostage Briefing. It's the best way to keep up to date with the cases we're working on as well as new episodes. You can subscribe to this newsletter using the link in the description of this podcast episode that you're currently listening to. Thanks again and take care.