Hailed as "la libertadora", in an allusion to Venezuelan independence hero Simon "The Liberator" Bolivar, Machado was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for her work.

"Is this for real? I can't believe it!," she said in conversation with exiled opposition presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia.

She was barred from challenging Maduro in July 2024 elections and went into hiding after the vote, which the opposition and much of the international community accuses Maduro of stealing.

But she remained a tireless democracy campaigner on social media, where she regularly posts videos assuring Venezuelans that change is near at hand.

Clad in jeans and a white shirt, Machado toured Venezuela last year to campaign for an end to a quarter century of increasingly repressive Socialist rule.

Her rousing speeches instill quasi-religious fervor in her supporters, many of whom are moved to tears by the sight of their plucky "liberator."

She won an opposition primary with 90 percent of votes cast in 2023, but was promptly declared ineligible by authorities loyal to Maduro.

Machado accepted to take a political back seat and campaign instead for her last-minute stand-in: little-known ex-diplomat Gonzalez Urrutia.

The opposition's tally of ballots from polling stations showed Gonzalez Urrutia easily defeating Maduro in the election -- but the Socialist incumbent was proclaimed the winner, sparking deadly riots, which were brutally repressed.

Gonzalez Urrutia went into exile after a bounty was placed on his head. Machado stayed behind to lead the resistance.

After months of hiding she briefly re-emerged on the eve of Maduro's inauguration for a third term in January to address an opposition rally.

"We are not afraid," she declared, before fleeing cloak-and-dagger style on the back of a motorcycle to avoid arrest.

- US strikes -

The Nobel announcement comes at a critical moment in a tense standoff between the United States and Venezuela.

President Donald Trump has ordered a major military deployment in the southern Caribbean, near Venezuela, and greenlighted strikes on suspected drug boats that have killed at least 21 people in recent weeks.

Washington, which recognized Gonzalez Urrutia as Venezuela's rightful leader, accuses Maduro of leading a drug cartel.

Machado has backed the US military pressure on Maduro as a "necessary measure" towards a democratic transition in Venezuela.

"Today, more than ever we count on President Trump, the people of the United States, the peoples of Latin America, and the democratic nations of the world as our main allies to achieve freedom and democracy," she wrote Friday on X.

- 'Bring our children home'

An engineer by training, Caracas-born Machado entered politics in 2002 at the head of the association Sumate (Join us), pushing for a referendum to recall Maduro's mentor, the late socialist leader Hugo Chavez.

She was accused of treason over the referendum call and received death threats, prompting her to send her two young sons and daughter to live abroad.

In parliament, she confronted the firebrand Chavez.

"Expropriating is stealing," she told him in 2012, referring to his seizures of hundreds of domestic and foreign-owned businesses.

Banned from flying during last year's election campaign, she criss-crossed the country by road, wearing rosary beads around her neck.

"We're going to liberate the country and bring our children home," she said, vowing an end to Maduro's rule -- and with it a severe economic crisis that has prompted over seven million people to emigrate from the once prosperous petro-state.

In October, she and Gonzalez Urrutia were awarded the European Union's top human rights prize for having "fearlessly upheld" the values of justice, democracy and the rule of law.