A month later, thousands marched in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas, demanding the release of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Celia Flores U.S. troops kidnapped The couple were involved in a bloody nighttime attack.

“Venezuela needs Nicolás!” the crowd chanted “Gran Marcha” (Great March) during Tuesday’s demonstration.

Thousands of people held signs in support of the kidnapped president, and many wore shirts calling for the couple’s return from custody in a U.S. prison.

“The Empire kidnapped them. We want them back,” declared one banner held by marchers.

Nicolas Maduro Guerra, the son of the detained president and a member of Venezuela’s National Assembly, addressed the crowd from the podium and said the Jan. 3 kidnapping of his father by U.S. troops “will always be remembered like the scars on our faces.”

“The land of our homeland was desecrated by foreign troops,” Maduro Guerra said of the night American troops kidnapped his father.

The march, called by the government and attended by many public sector workers, stretched hundreds of meters and was accompanied by blaring music from trucks.

Local media outlet Venezuela News said the march was part of a “global day of action” demanding the couple’s release. Protesters have expressed their solidarity around the world, demonstrating under banners with slogans such as “Bring them back” and “Hands off Venezuela.”

The international event brought together voices from “different ideological trends” who agreed that “the detention of President Maduro and Celia Flores is a flagrant violation of international law and a dangerous precedent for national sovereignty,” the news outlet said.

“We are confused, sad, angry. There are a lot of emotions,” said Jose Perdomo, a 58-year-old municipal employee who marched in Caracas.

“Sooner or later, they will have to free our president,” he said, adding that he also supported Venezuela interim leader Delcy Rodriguez.

Rodriguez has been treading carefully since taking over as acting president, trying to appease Maduro’s supporters in the government and meet U.S. President Donald Trump’s demands for Caracas.

Trump said he was willing to work with Rodriguez as long as Caracas met his demands, especially if the United States took action. Control Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.

Rodriguez, who has adopted a conciliatory approach to Washington and promised reform and reconciliation at home, has released hundreds of political prisoners and opened Venezuela’s nationalized hydrocarbons sector to private investment.

Hundreds of university students and relatives of political prisoners also marched in the capital earlier on Tuesday, calling for speedy approval of Rodriguez’s promised amnesty law that would free prisoners from the country’s prisons.

Legislation on the amnesty has not yet been tabled in parliament.