Posted on 01/04/2003 8:38:31 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Gunmen aligned with President Hugo Chavez fired on police officers Saturday after the government accused the Caracas police of killing two people during a melee at an opposition rally a day earlier, the police chief said. Two officers were wounded.
Saturday's shooting increased tensions in Venezuela, where a month-old opposition strike demanding Chavez's resignation has paralyzed oil exports and driven up international oil prices.
The shooting broke out during a wake for one of those slain, Oscar Gomez Aponte, 24. The two officers wounded were on duty at a small police station next to the Funeraria Valles funeral home in northern Caracas, Police Chief Henry Vivas said.
"They're trying to blame us for the deaths," Vivas said.
On Friday, gunfire erupted at an opposition march on the armed forces headquarters. Military police fired at both Chavez supporters and marchers, and unidentified snipers fired into the crowd.
At least 78 people were injured — five of them from gunfire. Both sides claimed the two dead as their own.
Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel, attending Saturday's wake, claimed the government had a videotape showing city police were responsible for Friday's shooting deaths.
The state news agency Venpres also accused Caracas police of provoking Friday's violence.
After Rangel's appearance at the wake, as many as 15 people approached the officers and fired automatic weapons, the police chief said.
Some of the attackers may have come from the wake; at least one fled back into the funeral home, Vivas said.
Officers returned fire using rubber bullets and tear gas. There were no immediate arrests, he added.
Chavez tried to take over the city police force — which reports to an opposition mayor — last fall. The Supreme Court ordered Chavez to restore the force's autonomy.
Chavez's critics blame his leftist policies for Venezuela's deep recession and accuse him of amassing authoritarian power and arming civilian militias. Chavez says strike leaders are seeking a coup.
Chavez's supporters staged a protest in Caracas on Saturday, while his opponents began raising money for a nonbinding referendum on his rule. Labor and business leaders began the strike on Dec. 2. Some 35,000 employees of Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. have joined.
The strike has virtually shut down oil production in the world's fifth-largest oil exporter, a top supplier to the United States. It has helped push international oil prices above $30 per barrel while oil workers have defied a back-to-work order by the Supreme Court.
Chavez said Friday he might consider imposing martial law to try to break the strike and halt escalating political violence. Opposition leaders, meanwhile, said the only way they could hold the referendum on Chavez's rule was if they paid for it themselves.
Leaders of the Democratic Coordinator opposition movement called on Venezuelans to donate between $1.80 and $3.50 to hold the referendum on Feb. 2 as planned.
"We have to take matters into our own hands because there are no signs suggesting the government is going to cooperate," said opposition leader Americo Martin.
The opposition had presented over 150,000 signatures to election authorities Nov. 6 to call for the referendum, but the national election commission says the Chavez-controlled Parliament hasn't authorized $22 million needed to pay for it.
Chavez, a former paratrooper who was elected in 1998 and re-elected two years later, has challenged the legality of the referendum at the Supreme Court.
The police are lining up as anti-Chavez, with the army still firmly under his control.
The people are overwhelmingly anti-Chavez with the very poor and leftist elitists in his camp.
The potential for bloodshed in the next couple of months is extraordinary.
http://www.militaresdemocraticos.com
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Time to return fire using real bullets, IMO.
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