Tag Archives: Maduro

Roads blocked round Venezuela as anti-Maduro protests persist

By Andrew Cawthorne

CARACAS (Reuters) – Manning barricades, sitting in deck chairs and sharing food, opposition supporters blocked roads in various parts of Venezuela on Monday to try to keep pressure on socialist President Nicolas Maduro.

Demonstrators have been on the streets daily since early April to demand elections, freedom for jailed activists, foreign humanitarian aid to offset Venezuela’s economic crisis, and autonomy for the opposition-controlled legislature.

Maduro accuses them of seeking a violent coup.

Protesters have used constantly varying tactics. Some rode horses through Caracas on Saturday, women took letters and flowers to police and military posts on Sunday’s Mother’s Day, and hundreds were joining planned daylong sit-ins from 7 a.m. on Monday.

“I’m here for the full 12 hours. And I’ll be back every day there’s a protest, for as long as is necessary,” said human resources worker Anelin Rojas, 30, sitting cross-legged with a novel and earphones in the middle of Caracas’ main highway.

“Unfortunately, we are up against a dictatorship. Nothing is going to change unless we force them,” added Rojas, surrounded by banners saying “Resistance!” and “Maduro, Your Time Is Up!”

Using branches, rocks and garbage, demonstrators blocked the main Francisco Fajardo thoroughfare in Caracas from soon after dawn. Many brought chairs, mats and food to last the day.

There were similar protests in other major cities around the South American nation of 30 million people.

In western Tachira state, some farmers were striking on Monday in solidarity with the protesters. They gave away milk and cheese so it would not go to waste, witnesses said.

The opposition, which commands majority support after years in the shadow of the ruling socialists, is more united than during the last wave of anti-Maduro protests in 2014.

But they have been unable to stop violence in their ranks, with youths hurling stones and petrol bombs, vandalizing property and starting fires when security forces block marches with tear gas, pepper spray and water cannons.

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

At least 39 people have died, including protesters, government sympathizers, bystanders, and security forces, during six weeks of protests. Hundreds have also been hurt and arrested.

The current wave of protests, which have attracted hundreds of thousands of demonstrators on some days, has drawn greater support from the poor – who backed late leader Hugo Chavez massively but have soured on his successor Maduro and who have suffered most from four years of recession. But the main protests have still been taking place in middle class areas.

Maduro, 54, who narrowly won election to replace Chavez in 2013, says he is the victim of an international right-wing conspiracy that has already brought down leftist governments in Brazil, Argentina and Peru in recent years.

As international pressure on him grows, the European Union on Monday became the latest to call for elections in its most outspoken statement yet on the Venezuela crisis.

Authorities thwarted an opposition push for a referendum last year and have also delayed state gubernatorial elections. But Maduro vowed at the weekend the next presidential election, due in late 2018, would go ahead.

“We will thrash them!” he predicted, though pollsters widely foresee defeat for the ruling Socialist Party at any open vote.

The government is also setting up a controversial body called a constituent assembly, with authority to rewrite the constitution and shake up public powers.

Maduro says that is needed to bring peace to Venezuela, but foes view it as a cynical tactic to buy time and create a biased body that could perpetuate the socialists’ rule.

(Additional reporting by Anggy Polanco in San Cristobal, Maria Ramirez in Ciudad Bolivar; Robin Emmott in Brussels; Editing by Frances Kerry)

Venezuela opposition seeks Latin American support for ‘democratic agenda’

President of the National Assembly and deputy of the Venezuelan coalition of opposition parties (MUD) Julio Borges talks to the media at the Congress in Lima, Peru, May 11, 2017. REUTERS/Guadalupe Pardo

LIMA (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition is asking other Latin American countries to pressure President Nicolas Maduro’s government into implementing a “democratic agenda,” opposition leader Julio Borges said on Thursday.

Borges, the president of Venezuela’s opposition-led National Assembly, traveled to Lima to meet with Peruvian legislators and President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, who has been one of Maduro’s most vocal critics among Latin American leaders.

He said the humanitarian crisis and strong protests against Maduro’s socialist government had crossed Venezuela’s borders because of a wave of refugees across the region.

“It’s important – fundamental – that we get several governments in the region to unite in the short term to make sure in Venezuela there exists nothing other than a popular and democratic agenda,” Borges told Reuters.

Venezuela has suffered through more than five weeks of violent anti-government protests in which 39 people have died. The opposition has decried Maduro as an autocrat who has wrecked the OPEC member’s economy, and demanded elections to resolve the political crisis.

Peru recalled its ambassador to Caracas in late March.

Appearing together with Borges in the Presidential Palace later on Thursday, Kuczynski said he had “no desire to interfere in the internal matters of other countries” but that countries in the region must support the wellbeing of Venezuela’s people and provide “humanitarian assistance.”

Kuczynski said he told Borges that “we’re prepared to help with this, to help as part of a group of American countries that are worried about an important neighbor. Venezuela is the number one issue in America.”

Borges said the aim of the strategy of street protests and calls for international pressure was to “break the conscience of the armed forces and the political groups” that still support Maduro, and to avoid more deaths.

He told Peruvian reporters after his speech to Peru’s congress that he would travel to Brazil next week to convene a summit with congressional leaders from across the region to push for a “democratic transition” in Venezuela.

Socialist Venezuela has lost many regional allies as several Latin American countries have moved to the right in recent years.

“There’s a new map in Latin America that I’m sure will strongly support this democratic agenda for Venezuela,” Borges said.

Last week, Borges met with U.S. President Donald Trump’s national security advisor H.R. McMaster, where they agreed on the need to bring Venezuela’s crisis to a quick and peaceful conclusion.

(Reporting by Reuters TV and Marco Aquino; Writing by Luc Cohen; Editing by Alistair Bell and Grant McCool)

Venezuela protesters fling feces at soldiers; unrest takes 2 more lives

Opposition supporters clash with riot security forces while rallying against President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela, May 10, 2017. REUTERS/Marco Bello

(This story contains language in second paragraph that some readers may find offensive)

By Andrew Cawthorne and Carlos Rawlins

CARACAS (Reuters) – Young Venezuelan protesters lobbed bottles and bags of feces at soldiers who fought with tear gas on Wednesday to block the latest march in more than a month of nationwide protests against socialist President Nicolas Maduro.

The extraordinary scenes, in what was dubbed the “Shit March” on the main highway through Caracas, came as thousands of opposition supporters again poured onto the streets decrying Venezuela’s economic crisis and demanding elections.

“These kids live in a dictatorship, they have no other option but to protest however they see fit,” said Maria Montilla, 49, behind lines of youths with masks, slingshots and makeshift wooden shields.

Many carried stones and so-called “Poopootov cocktails” – feces stuffed into small glass bottles – that they threw when National Guard troops blocked their path, firing gas and turning water cannons on the crowds.

“There’s nothing explosive here. It’s our way of saying, ‘Get lost Maduro, you’re useless!'” said one young protester, who asked not to be named, between tossing bottles of feces.

The state prosecutor’s office said 27-year-old Miguel Castillo was killed during Wednesday’s protests in Caracas, without giving details. Motorbike taxi driver Anderson Dugarte, 32, died on Wednesday in the Andean city of Merida after being injured in a protest.

Interior Minister Nestor Reverol said in comments broadcast by state television that Dugarte was killed by a sniper linked to the opposition’s Democratic Unity coalition. He said Castillo also was killed by a firearm.

At least 39 people have died in the unrest since early April, including protesters, government sympathizers, bystanders, and security forces. Hundreds have also been hurt and arrested.

Maduro says foes are seeking a coup with U.S. encouragement.

The opposition, which enjoys majority support after years in the shadow of the ruling Socialist Party, says authorities are denying a solution to Venezuela’s crisis by thwarting a referendum, delaying local elections and refusing to bring forward the 2018 presidential vote.

They are seeking to vary tactics to keep momentum going and supporters energized.

The government accused the opposition of breaking international treaties on biological and chemical weapons by throwing feces.

Maduro is seeking to create a new super body called a “constituent assembly,” with authority to rewrite the constitution and shake up public powers. Foes dismiss it as an attempt to keep the socialists in power by establishing a biased new assembly.

“They closed all the democratic doors, we warned how dangerous that would be for our country,” said opposition leader Henrique Capriles, joining protesters on the highway.

“FAITHFUL TO CHAVEZ”

In downtown Caracas, government supporters also rallied, dancing salsa and waving pictures of Maduro’s predecessor Hugo Chavez who remains venerated by many, especially the poor.

“I’m here to support the constituent process, which brings opportunities to resolve the crisis,” said agriculture worker Ilian Leon, 40. “We’re faithful to Chavez’s legacy.”

Rights group Penal Forum says 1,991 people have been detained since April 1, with 653 still behind bars.

Opposition leaders have complained the government is processing 250 detainees via military courts.

The state prosecutor’s office, which has in recent months, been dissenting from the government over judicial matters, said 14 prisoners accused of destroying a statue of Chavez in western Zulia state should be judged in civilian not military courts.

“They are not military officials, so it is wrong to judge them in that jurisdiction,” it said, without mentioning other cases raised by the opposition.

Maduro, 54, a former bus driver and foreign minister under Chavez, and his allies appear to be hoping the opposition will run out of steam and are banking on a rise in oil prices to help assuage four years of recession.

They are seizing on vandalism by young opposition hotheads who burn rubbish in the streets and smash public property, to depict the whole movement as intent on violence.

The protests so far have failed to garner massive support from poorer, traditionally pro-Chavez sectors of Venezuela’s 30 million people. But a bigger cross-section of society has been apparent at recent marches, some of which drew hundreds of thousands.

Looting has been breaking out in some cities, especially at night.

Chavez’s former spy-master, Miguel Torres, has broken with Maduro’s government, despite having served as interior minister and fighting against protests in 2014. He warned on Wednesday that the violence in Venezuela may be getting out of control.

“What is happening may be the starting point for a huge armed confrontation between Venezuelans,” he told Reuters.

“Nobody wants that.”

(Additional reporting by Jackson Gomez, Andreina Aponte, Girish Gupta, Corina Pons and Diego Ore in Caracas; Editing by Tom Brown and Bill Trott)

Venezuela opposition boycotts meeting on Maduro assembly, clashes rage

Opposition supporters clash with riot police during a rally against President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela, May 8, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition boycotted a meeting on Monday to discuss President Nicolas Maduro’s plan for a new popular assembly, preferring to protest in the streets where they were again blocked by security forces firing tear gas.

In familiar scenes from five weeks of unrest, youths with gas masks and makeshift shields faced off with police and National Guard troops in Caracas, after hundreds of demonstrators were stopped from reaching government offices.

In Venezuela’s second city Maracaibo, a crowd of about 300 protesters shouting “Maduro Out!” and “No to Dictatorship!” was dispersed with multiple volleys of tear gas.

Decrying Maduro as an autocrat who has wrecked the OPEC nation’s economy, Venezuela’s opposition is demanding elections to resolve Venezuela’s grave political crisis.

The 54-year-old successor to Hugo Chavez says his foes are seeking a coup with U.S. support. He is setting up a “constituent assembly” super body with power to rewrite the constitution and shake up public powers.

But no representatives of the opposition Democratic Unity coalition went to the Miraflores presidential palace on Monday despite an invitation from Education Minister Elias Jaua who is leading the constituent assembly process.

“It’s a trick to keep themselves in power,” said Julio Borges, leader of the National Assembly legislature where the opposition won a majority in 2015.

“The only way to resolve this crisis is with a free vote.”

The unrest has killed at least 37 people since early April, including protesters, government sympathizers, bystanders, and security forces. Hundreds have also been hurt and arrested.

Local rights group Penal Forum said 1,845 people had been detained since April 1 over the protests, with 591 still behind bars. Opposition leaders said 200 of those were being processed by military tribunals in Carabobo state.

Perhaps to justify the use of those military tribunals, officials say they are now facing an “armed insurrection”. Red-shirted Maduro supporters also rallied in Caracas on Monday.

(Reporting by Andrew Cawthorne and Corina Pons in Caracas, Isaac Burrutia in Maracaibo; Editing by Tom Brown)

Venezuela protests rage, jailed Lopez supporters stage vigil

Opposition supporters stand in front of a fire during clashes with riot police at a rally against President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela May 3, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

By Alexandra Ulmer and Diego Oré

CARACAS (Reuters) – Supporters of jailed Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez held a vigil outside his prison demanding to see him on Thursday after rumors about his health rattled the protest-hit country where the death toll from anti-government unrest rose to 36.

Lopez’s wife and mother rushed to a military hospital in Caracas and then the hilltop Ramo Verde jail overnight, after a journalist tweeted Lopez had been taken to a medical center without vital signs.

President Nicolas Maduro’s leftist government, facing a wave of major opposition protests since last month, later issued a short “proof of life” video in which Lopez said he was fine.

Officials accused Lopez’s family of stirring up a media frenzy to get attention and further stoke the protests.

“Today is May 3, it’s 9 p.m. … I’m sending a message to my family and my children that I am well,” said Lopez, 46, standing cross-armed in front of cell bars and looking healthy in a sleeveless white T-shirt.

But Lopez’s wife Lilian Tintori, who says she has not been allowed to see him in over a month, rejected the video as “false” and spent the night outside the jail.

“The only proof of life that we will accept is to see Leopoldo,” she tweeted, as she and Lopez’s mother faced a line of green-clad National Guard soldiers at the prison. They later rotated out with some supporters to get sleep.

Lopez is Venezuela’s most prominent imprisoned politician, and U.S. President Donald Trump in February called for his release after a White House meeting with Tintori.

Venezuelans, already on tenterhooks after the unrest that has killed protesters, government supporters, bystanders and security officials, were shaken by the rumors over Lopez, who was jailed in 2014 during the last major round of protests.

The U.S.-educated economist and leader of the hard-line Popular Will party is accused of inciting violence, and in 2015 was sentenced to almost 14 years behind bars.

The government says he is a dangerous agitator, pointing to his involvement in a brief 2002 coup against the late Hugo Chavez, when Lopez even helped arrest a Cabinet minister.

“They’re inventing that something or other has been done to Leopoldo to put together a big, pretty show, so that we forget the 43 deaths he caused,” said Socialist Party No. 2 Diosdado Cabello, in reference to those killed during unrest in 2014.

Lopez’s supporters say he was tried in a kangaroo court because he had been viewed as a future presidential hopeful and a threat to Maduro. Others in the opposition deem him a divisive hothead who took to the streets too early and say his supporters exaggerate incidents to get support.

HUNDREDS JAILED

Over 1,700 people have been arrested, with 597 of them still jailed, since the unrest began in early April, according to rights group Penal Forum. Hundreds have been injured, often in confusing street melees between stone-throwing youths and security forces firing tear gas and water cannons.

Maduro’s call on Monday to rewrite the constitution has energized the protest movement, and images of a military vehicle running over a demonstrator on Wednesday caused further outrage.

The opposition is so far maintaining momentum despite fatigue, injuries, disruptions to daily life, and fears that protests will end up flopping like so many times in the past.

Still, none of their demands have been met so far and Maduro has said he will not bend to them.

Demonstrators are seeking early elections to remove Maduro and bring an end to a devastating recession that has food and medicine running short. The government says the opposition wants a coup and many demonstrators are simply vandals.

Various groups of students took to the streets on Thursday.

One group of several hundred from Venezuela’s Central University tried to reach a highway but were blocked by National Guard soldiers firing tear gas.

“We’re going to stay here until this corrupt and lying government falls,” said Ines Delgado, 22, with anti-acid indigestion medicine smeared on her face to neutralize the effects of tear gas.

The death toll in violent Venezuela’s month of unrest has been creeping up, reaching at least 36 after two latest cases.

A 38-year-old policeman in Carabobo state, Gerardo Barrera, died overnight after being shot during a protest, the public prosecutor’s office said on Thursday.

And Juan Lopez, a 33-year old president of a student federation at a university in the western Anzoategui state, was gunned down during a student assembly on Thursday, the public prosecutor’s office added. A member of the public approached him, shot him several times, and then fled on a motorcycle.

With international pressure piling on Maduro, famed Venezuelan conductor Gustavo Dudamel, who directs the Los Angeles Philharmonic, came out against him in a letter decrying repression.

(Additional reporting by Andrew Cawthorne, Andreina Aponte, Corina Pons, Eyanir Chinea, Brian Ellsworth; Writing by Alexandra Ulmer; Editing by W Simon, Andrew Cawthorne and Andrew Hay)

Venezuela death toll rises as foes protest Maduro’s power shakeup

Opposition supporters clash with riot police during a rally against President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela, May 3, 2017. REUTERS/Christian Veron

By Andrew Cawthorne and Alexandra Ulmer

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan security forces battled protesters who lit fires and hurled stones on Wednesday in rage at President Nicolas Maduro’s decree to create an alternative congress, with another fatality taking the death toll to 34 during a month of unrest.

In a familiar pattern in protests against the socialist government, thousands of opposition supporters rallied peacefully at first before being blocked, sparking fights around the city between masked youths and soldiers.

One 17-year-old protester died in the melee from an object that hit him in the neck, said Gerardo Blyde, a district mayor for the opposition.

“A young man with all his life ahead. He simply fought for a better country,” Blyde said on Twitter of the case which the Venezuelan state prosecutor’s office said it would investigate.

More than 200 people were injured as fights raged in various parts of the capital, Blyde and another opposition mayor said.

Marchers tried to reach the National Assembly legislature, where the opposition has a majority, to protest Maduro’s creation of an alternative “popular” congress viewed by foes as a ruse to dodge free elections and cling to power.

They were pushed back by National Guard troops with teargas, armored vehicles and riot shields on the Francisco Fajardo highway, which runs through the middle of the city.

“They are mobilized as if this was a war,” said opposition leader Henrique Capriles, broadcasting from the scene via the Periscope app favored by protest leaders.

On the opposition side, youths donned gas masks and bandanas, throwing Molotov cocktails and using slingshots to fire stones. They protected themselves with homemade shields, painted in bright colors and decorated with slogans like “Liberty!” and “Murderer Maduro!”

Local media published footage showing two protesters being knocked over by a National Guard vehicle. Both survived.

With demonstrators erecting barricades and police helicopters whirring overhead, at least three opposition lawmakers were injured, activists said. “An injury by the dictatorship is a badge of honor,” tweeted First Justice legislator Freddy Guevara, who said he was hit by a tear gas canister.

Opposition leaders have vowed to stay in the streets after Maduro’s announcement on Monday that he was creating the “constituent assembly” which is empowered to rewrite the constitution.

“It’s a tool to avoid free elections. We’ve been marching 18 years but this is our last card. It’s all or nothing,” said pensioner Miren Bilbao, 66, with friends and family on the Francisco Fajardo highway.

While the opposition was keeping up momentum, it was unclear how the protests could achieve their aims after demonstrations in 2014 failed to dislodge Maduro. Back then, however, the opposition was splintered, protests failed to spread to poor areas and the economy was in better shape.

“WE DESERVE PEACE”

Maduro, 54, the former bus driver who narrowly won election to replace Hugo Chavez in 2013, says his foes are seeking a violent coup with the connivance of the United States and encouragement of international media.

Officials say violence around the protests, and the opposition’s unwillingness to hold talks, left Maduro with no choice but to shake up Venezuela’s governing apparatus.

During a meeting with election officials on Wednesday, Maduro said a vote for the new assembly would take place in coming weeks. At least half of the members would be chosen by grassroots groups including workers, indigenous people and farmers, and the rest in a vote, Maduro has said, although details remained fuzzy.

“The new constituent process starting today will consolidate the Republic and bring to the nation the peace that we all deserve,” he said, clutching a pocket-size blue constitution and later dancing to the beat of drums.

“The Republic must defend itself from terrorism,” he added, joining supporters in a rally downtown after presenting his plans to the national election board, which backed the move.

The opposition is seeking to hold state gubernatorial elections delayed from 2016 and bring forward the 2018 presidential vote amid a devastating economic crisis.

It says Maduro’s use of a “constituent assembly” is a cynical ploy to confuse citizens into thinking he has made concessions when in fact he is seeking to tweak the system to avoid elections the Socialist Party would likely lose.

Maduro’s move has drawn condemnation from the United States and some Latin American countries, including regional powerhouse Brazil that labeled it a “coup.”

An influential group of U.S. senators filed sweeping legislation on Wednesday to address the crisis in Venezuela, including sanctioning individuals responsible for undermining democracy or involved in corruption.

But backing has come from regional leftist allies including Cuba. Bolivia’s President Evo Morales said Venezuela had the right to “decide its future… without external intervention.”

On top of the latest death on Wednesday, officials announced four more fatalities on Tuesday.

Two people died when a vehicle tried to avoid a protester barricade in the state of Carabobo, Venezuela’s Civil Protection agency tweeted late on Tuesday.

Angel Moreira, 28, who was on a motorbike on a highway leading out of Caracas, also died after a vehicle ran him over while trying to avoid a demonstration, the state prosecutor’s office said on Wednesday.

In addition, the office said Yonathan Quintero, 21, had been killed while a group was “damaging” a business after a protest in the Carabobo state capital of Valencia.

Energy Minister Luis Motta said late on Tuesday “a right-wing terrorist plan to paralyze the country” had cut a submarine cable that provided electricity to the palm-tree-studded Caribbean island of Margarita, plunging it into darkness.

The president of state oil company PDVSA, Eulogio Del Pino, said “terrorists” had captured a company tanker truck in the western state of Lara, tweeting pictures of it in flames.

The opposition scoffs that an inept government blames Maduro critics as a smokescreen for rampant crime and lack of maintenance that have Venezuela’s infrastructure creaking.

(Additional reporting by Diego Ore, Andreina Aponte, Corina Pons, Brian Ellsworth, Deisy Buitrago and Eyanir Chinea in Caracas, Isaac Urrutia in Maracaibo, Maria Ramirez in Puerto Ordaz, and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Writing by Alexandra Ulmer and Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by Diane Craft and Andrew Hay)

Exclusive: U.S. senators seek sanctions, other ways to address Venezuela crisis

Demonstrators run as they clash with police during a rally against Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An influential group of Republican and Democratic U.S. senators will file sweeping legislation on Wednesday to address the crisis in Venezuela, including sanctioning individuals responsible for undermining democracy or involved in corruption, Senate aides said.

The bill would provide $10 million in humanitarian aid to the struggling country, require the State Department to coordinate a regional effort to ease the crisis, and ask U.S. intelligence to report on the involvement of Venezuelan government officials in corruption and the drug trade, according to a copy seen by Reuters.

It also calls on President Donald Trump to take all necessary steps to prevent Rosneft, Russia’s state oil company, from gaining control of any U.S. energy infrastructure.

Rosneft has been gaining ground in Venezuela as the country scrambles for cash. The Venezuelan state oil company, PDVSA, last year used 49.9 percent of its shares in its U.S. subsidiary, Citgo, as collateral for loan financing by Rosneft.

In total, Rosneft has lent PDVSA between $4 billion and $5 billion.

The measure comes as the international community has struggled to respond to deep economic crisis and street protests in the South American OPEC nation.

Some 29 people have been killed, more than 400 injured and hundreds more arrested since demonstrations against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s government began in April amid severe shortages of food and medicine, deep recession and hyper-inflation.

On Tuesday, Venezuela’s opposition blocked streets in the capital, Caracas, to denounce Maduro’s decision to create a “constituent assembly,” which critics said was a veiled attempt to cling to power by avoiding elections.

Senate aides said the bill sought to react to the crisis by working with countries across the Americas and international organizations, rather than unilaterally, while targeting some of the root causes of the crisis and supporting human rights.

U.S. officials have long been reluctant to be too vocal about Venezuela, whose leaders accuse Washington of being the true force behind opposition to the country’s leftist government.

PROMINENT SPONSORS

The lead sponsors of the legislation are Senator Ben Cardin, the senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Senator Marco Rubio, the Republican chairman of the panel’s western hemisphere subcommittee and a vocal critic of Venezuela’s government.

Boosting its chances of getting through Congress, co-sponsors include Senator John Cornyn, the chamber’s No. 2 Republican, and Senator Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat, as well as Republican Senator John McCain, the influential chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

The bill has 11 sections, seeking to deal with the crisis with a broad brush.

Addressing corruption, it would require the U.S. State Department and intelligence agencies to prepare an unclassified report, with a classified annex, on any involvement of Venezuelan government officials in corruption and the drug trade.

The U.S. Treasury Department has in the past sanctioned Venezuelan officials or former officials, charging them with trafficking or corruption, a designation that allows their assets in the United States to be frozen and bars them from conducting financial transactions through the United States.

The officials have denied the charges, and called them a pretext as part of an effort to topple Maduro’s government.

The new legislation seeks to put into law sanctions imposed under former President Barack Obama’s executive order targeting individuals found to “undermine democratic governance” or involved in corruption.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Venezuela opposition blocks streets to protest Maduro’s power shakeup

Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro speaks during his weekly broadcast "Los Domingos con Maduro" (The Sundays with Maduro) in Caracas, Venezuela. Miraflores Palace/via REUTERS

By Alexandra Ulmer

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s opposition was blocking streets on Tuesday to decry unpopular leftist President Nicolas Maduro’s decision to create a new super-body known as a “constituent assembly,” a move they say is a veiled attempt to cling to power by avoiding elections.

After a month of near-daily protests demanding early general elections, Maduro on Monday announced a new popular assembly with the ability to rewrite the constitution.

His government says that the opposition is promoting street violence and refusing dialogue, so it has no choice but to shake up Venezuela’s power structure to bring peace to the oil producer.

Maduro’s foes counter that Maduro, a former bus driver they say has turned into a dictator, is in fact planning to staff the new assembly with supporters and avoid elections he would likely lose amid a crushing recession and raging inflation.

Regional elections slated for last year have yet to be called and a presidential election is due for next year.

When asked about elections in an interview on state television Tuesday, the Socialist Party official in charge of the constituent assembly said the electoral schedule would be respected but also suggested the current political turmoil was working against setting a quick date.

‘NO NORMALITY’

“One of the aims of the constituent assembly is to seek the conditions of stability to be able to go to those electoral processes,” said Elias Jaua.

“Those conditions of normality do not exist,” he added, citing protests and institutional clashes between the opposition-led National Assembly and authorities.

Maduro’s critics fear the new body will further sideline the current opposition-led legislature and pave the way for undemocratic changes to the constitution, furthering what they say has been a lurch into dictatorship.

The controversial decision will likely swell anti-government protests, already the biggest since 2014, as they seek to end the socialists’ 18-year rule started under late leader Hugo Chavez.

“This is not a constituent assembly, it’s the dissolution of the republic,” said opposition lawmaker Freddy Guevara. “A message to Chavismo: It’s time to unite to save Venezuela from Maduro.”

Since anti-Maduro unrest began in early April, some 29 people have been killed, more than 400 people have been injured and hundreds more arrested.

Some road blocks were already being set up in the capital Caracas early on Tuesday, with lawmakers posting photos of people waving flags in the rain, and the opposition was set to march again on Wednesday.

While many details remain unclear about the constituent assembly, Maduro said political parties would not participate and that only up to half of its 500 members would be elected.

“According to the government, it would have all powers,” said Jose Ignacio Hernandez, law professor at Venezuela’s Catholic University. “It could dissolve the National Assembly, name a new electoral council, dismiss governors, and dismiss mayors.”

(Additonal reporting by Diego Ore and Andrew Cawthorne; Writing by Alexandra Ulmer; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

‘End the injustice’ pleads Venezuelan official’s son over unrest

Opposition supporters clash with security forces during a rally against Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

By Alexandra Ulmer

CARACAS (Reuters) – The son of Venezuela’s pro-government human rights ombudsman has surprised the country amid major protests against the leftist administration by publicly urging his father to “end the injustice.”

The opposition has accused ombudsman Tarek Saab, whose title is “defender of the people,” of turning a blind eye to rights abuses and a lurch into dictatorship by unpopular President Nicolas Maduro.

Some 29 people have died during this month’s unrest.

In many of the vast street protests in Caracas in recent days, marchers aimed to converge on his office, but security forces firing tear gas and water cannons blocked them.

So Venezuelans were shocked to see Saab’s son, a law student, breaking ranks with his powerful father and saying he himself had been a victim of what he called government repression against marchers.

“Dad, in this moment you have the power to end the injustice that has sunk this country,” said Yibram Saab in a YouTube video late on Wednesday, sitting outside and reading from a paper.

“I ask you as your son, and in the name of Venezuela that you represent, that you reflect and do what you must do,” added the younger Saab.

His father’s support would be key to allowing lawmakers to open a case to remove the magistrates of the pro-government Supreme Court, who have overridden the opposition-led National Assembly.

In the video, Saab’s son said he suffered “brutal repression” from security forces on Wednesday, when a 20-year-old demonstrator was killed by a tear gas canister that hit him in the chest. “It could have been me,” said Yibram Saab.

The ombudsman, a former student leader who became a poet, lawyer, and Socialist Party governor, responded in a radio interview later on Thursday, saying he respected his son’s right of opinion and loved him just the same.

“I love him, I adore him, whatever he might have said,” he told La Romantica station, adding that he always defended rights and condemned violence no matter which side it came on.

Maduro’s son called on Saab’s son to reconsider.

The president’s son echoed the government stance that demonstrators are terrorists trying to instigate a coup amid the biggest protests since 2014.

“Your three minutes of fame could have been different. I think you could have picked up the phone and spoken with your father, expressing to him your love and concern and listening to him,” wrote Nicolas Maduro Guerra.

The government has long accused the opposition of attempting to stage a coup, citing a short-lived attempt in 2002 against former President Hugo Chavez.

Saab, a staunch Chavez ally, was himself detained for a few hours during that coup, according to rights groups.

OPPOSITION BOOST

Opposition leaders said the video was evidence of fissures within “Chavismo,” a movement founded by the charismatic Chavez that has taken a hit under Maduro, a former bus driver and union leader whose presidency has been marked by a stark recession.

The opposition hoped Saab’s video would spur protesters to keep up street action despite fatigue, injuries, arrests and no sign of concessions from Maduro.

“The majority of us want a change, and that includes the families of those who today prop up this regime,” tweeted opposition lawmaker Juan Andres Mejia.

Maduro’s opponents are demanding a general election, the release of jailed activists, humanitarian aid to help offset shortages of food and medicine, and autonomy for the legislature.

They have been galvanized by international condemnation of Maduro’s government and Caracas’ increasing diplomatic isolation.

In what might have been a pre-emptive move to avoid expulsion, Venezuela has said it will withdraw from the Organization of American States, the first nation to do so in the bloc’s more than century-old history.

The head of the regional body had said Venezuela could be expelled, accusing Maduro of eroding the country’s democracy by delaying elections and refusing to respect the legislature.

“Today, Venezuela woke up freer than yesterday,” Maduro said in a speech to a women’s meeting on Thursday. “OAS, go to hell!”

Communist ally Cuba, which has not returned to the OAS after being suspended from 1962-2009, backed Venezuela “in this new chapter of resistance and dignity.”

But the United States said it would like Venezuela to remain in the OAS, so long as it complies with requirements. Separately, President Donald Trump, a strong critic of Maduro, said the situation in Venezuela is “very sad.”

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini condemned the violence in Venezuela, sent condolences over the dead, and urged the government to both protect peaceful protesters and set “a clear electoral calendar”

(Additional reporting by Girish Gupta and Andrew Cawthorne in Caracas, Lesley Wroughton in Washington D.C. and Nelson Acosta in Havana; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, and Andrew Hay)

Hooded youths in Venezuela mar opposition efforts at peaceful protest

FILE PHOTO: Demonstrator sits next to a fire barricade on a street during a rally against Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas, Venezuela April 24, 2017. REUTERS/Christian Veron/File Photo

By Brian Ellsworth

CARACAS (Reuters) – Protesters blocked a highway in Venezuela’s capital Caracas for nearly eight hours this week in an effort to show the opposition’s dedication to civil disobedience as their main tool to resist President Nicolas Maduro.

But by the end of the afternoon, hooded youths had filled the highway with burning debris, looted a government storage site, torched two trucks and stolen medical equipment from an ambulance.

“This is no peaceful protest, they’re damaging something that belongs to the state and could be used to help one of their own family members,” said Wilbani Leon, head of a paramedic team that services Caracas highways, showing the damage to the ambulance.

Anti-government demonstrations entering their fourth week are being marred by street violence despite condemnation by opposition leaders and clear instructions that the protests should be peaceful.

Such daytime violence also increasingly presages late-night looting of businesses in working-class areas of Caracas, a sign that political protests could extend into broad disruptions of public order driven by growing hunger.

The opposition’s so-far unsuccessful struggle to contain its violent factions has helped Maduro depict it as a group of thugs plotting to overthrow him the way opposition leaders briefly ousted late socialist leader Hugo Chavez in 2002.

CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE, VIOLENT PROTEST

The unrest has killed at least 29 people so far and was triggered by a Supreme Court decision in March to briefly assume powers of the opposition Congress. Maduro’s opponents say the former bus driver and union leader who took office four years ago has turned into a dictator.

The vast majority of demonstrators shun the violence that usually starts when marches are winding down or after security forces break up protests.

That gives way to small groups of protesters, many with faces covered, who set fire to trash and rip gates off private establishments or drag sheet metal from construction sites to build barricades.

They clash with security forces in confused melees. Police and troops break up the demonstrations by firing copious amounts of tear gas that often floods nearby apartment buildings and in some cases health clinics.

The opposition has blamed the disturbances on infiltrators planted by the ruling Socialist Party to delegitimize protests, which demand Maduro hold delayed elections and respect the autonomy of the opposition-run Congress.

But even before rallies devolve into street violence, tensions frequently surface between demonstrators seeking peaceful civil disobedience and those looking for confrontation – some of whom are ordinary Venezuelans angry over chronic product shortages and triple-digit inflation.

“If we just ask him ‘Mr. President, would you be so kind as to leave?’ he’s not going to leave,” said Hugo Nino, 38, who use to work at a bakery but lost his job after Maduro passed a resolution boosting state control over bread production.

“Resistance, protesting with anger, that’s how we have to do it,” he said.

He and some others at the Caracas highway sit-in on Monday morning bristled at opposition leaders’ calls for non-violence.

An unrelated group of people collected tree trunks and metal debris to barricade the road. They covered one section with oil, making it dangerous for police motorcycles to cross it.

TRUCKS ON FIRE

By 4 p.m., opposition legislators had started walking through the crowd with megaphones, asking that people leave the protest as had been planned.

The thinning crowd remained calm until a tear gas canister was heard being fired in the distance. Demonstrators reacted by banging on a metal highway barrier with pipes and rocks.

A small group then broke into a government compound that houses cargo trucks and highway-repair materials, and made off with cables, pipes and wooden pallets and other materials for barricades.

The team of paramedics that works in the unguarded compound did nothing to stop them, out of what they said was concern for their personal safety. They did halt two youths trying to steal a car with an eye toward setting it alight.

The demonstrators later set fire to two cargo trucks.

One teenager, stripped from the waist up and with a t-shirt covering his face, urged nearby reporters to take pictures of the blaze but drew the line at appearing himself.

“Delete that video,” he said, pointing to a Reuters reporter filming him.

(Reporting by Brian Ellsworth; Editing by Alexandra Ulmer; Christian Plumb and Andrew Hay)