Speaking at a press conference, Rodríguez said thousands of people remain missing following the June 24 earthquakes but stressed that authorities had no plans to establish mass graves. She said 189 buildings were completely destroyed, with the coastal state of La Guaira bearing the brunt of the devastation, while more than 11,000 people were injured.

The government said reconstruction efforts were gathering pace as international financial institutions pledged support. Rodríguez announced that the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank had offered financial assistance and credit to aid recovery, including the establishment of a $200 million reconstruction fund with the IMF to finance the rebuilding of homes destroyed in the disaster.

She also said revenue from Venezuela’s oil production, currently administered under U.S. Treasury oversight following the removal of former President Nicolás Maduro, would be allocated to reconstruction projects and humanitarian assistance.

The United States has committed more than $300 million in relief assistance and deployed approximately 900 military personnel to support search-and-rescue operations and humanitarian relief. U.S. Chargé d’Affaires John M. Barrett said the funding would support emergency shelter, sanitation, healthcare services and electricity generation.

In the hardest-hit communities of La Guaira, hopes of finding additional survivors continued to diminish. Rescue teams worked through collapsed buildings in response to reports of possible signs of life, while officials transported body bags and prepared caskets in the port city of Catia La Mar.

A rare rescue offered a brief moment of optimism when 43-year-old security guard Hernán Alberto Gil Flores was pulled alive from the ruins of a collapsed shopping mall after surviving nearly eight days beneath the debris. Rescue workers said he endured by remaining inside an air pocket and receiving food and water passed through narrow openings in the wreckage.

Elsewhere, recovery teams continued retrieving bodies as decomposition complicated rescue operations. Health authorities warned that overcrowded temporary shelters and untreated injuries could increase the risk of infectious disease outbreaks in a healthcare system already under significant pressure.

Rodríguez rejected criticism that her administration had responded too slowly during the initial hours after the earthquakes. She said emergency services had been activated immediately and acknowledged that relatives, neighbors and local residents were often the first to reach collapsed buildings before official rescue teams arrived.

“We did not wait one day, two days or three days. We activated immediately,” Rodríguez said, accusing critics of attempting to politicize the humanitarian emergency.

The disaster also claimed the lives of Venezuelan nationals deported from the United States shortly before the earthquakes. Daniel Alejandro Núñez Ramírez, 28, was among more than 100 deportees who returned to Venezuela hours before the disaster. According to relatives, many of the 146 deportees housed in a hotel serving as a temporary holding facility in La Guaira were trapped when the building collapsed.

“My son was not a criminal,” his mother, Oswadeliz Nuñez, said after collecting his ashes. “I don’t want this death to go unpunished.”

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said responsibility for the deportees transferred to Venezuelan authorities after their arrival.

Questions also remain over Rodríguez’s political future, with her 180-day mandate as interim president due to expire on Friday. Under Venezuela’s constitution, the National Assembly could either extend the interim administration or call a snap presidential election if the office is formally declared vacant.

Human rights organizations have meanwhile called for transparency in the management of reconstruction funds. Laura Cristina Dib, Venezuela program director at the Washington Office on Latin America, said effective oversight would be essential to ensure financial assistance reaches communities affected by the country’s deadliest natural disaster in decades.