Posted on 02/20/2003 1:40:07 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
CARACAS, Venezuela, Feb. 19 - Venezuela was still reeling today after the weekend killings of three dissident soldiers and a protester opposed to President Hugo Chávez, and the police and grieving relatives split over whether the killings were politically motivated.
According to police investigations, about 12 armed men kidnapped the four victims on Saturday night as they were leaving a protest. They were bound and gagged, and some were tortured before the gunmen executed them, the police said.
The last two bodies, badly decomposed and showing signs of torture, were found on Tuesday on the outskirts of Caracas.
The case has fueled opposition fears that Mr. Chávez may be leading the country toward armed struggle by encouraging supporters to silence dissenting voices, more than 10 months after narrowly surviving a coup led by rebel officers.
The police tried to soothe frayed nerves today, saying the motive for the killings appeared to be revenge, not politics. They cited reports of a scuffle on Saturday between the soldiers and a fellow protester, Edgar Leonardo Machado, who has become the lead suspect in the killings.
Family members of the victims criticized the investigations as corrupt. They accused the police of trying to avert a scandal and said the four dead were clearly killed for their protests against Mr. Chávez.
"They want to clear themselves politically, and they say it's about revenge," said Miguel Pinto, whose 21-year-old brother, Felix Pinto, a member of the country's air force, was one of the dead. "My brother had no enemies. The only enemy we have here is Hugo Chávez."
Despite occasional violence in Venezuela's political standoff, there have been no confirmed selective killings of Mr. Chávez's allies or enemies. Still, street clashes have claimed at least seven lives and have left scores wounded since December.
Mr. Chávez has styled his government on Cuban socialist ideals and the nationalist fervor of Venezuela's 19th century revolutionary leader, Simón Bolivár.
After gaining power in 1998, he set up community networks called Bolivarian Circles, which were meant to spread the word of his revolution.
But the opposition says Mr. Chavez's supporters take his calls to defend the revolution literally. They brand the groups Circles of Terror, and they have started their own armed groups to oppose them.
The political situation, with daily marches by supporters and opponents of the president, is growing more tense as Mr. Chávez refuses to bend to opposition calls to hold early elections. His term in office ends in 2007.
The police say that the testimony of a 14-year-old girl will be vital to solving the killings. The girl is thought to be the girlfriend of Mr. Pinto, and she was abducted along with the four but survived the shooting, the police said. She has been hospitalized and was unable to give investigators a formal statement.
The case is mired in controversy, especially since it appears to involve a deadly Dec. 6 shooting at the Plaza Altamira, which was witnessed by two of the victims.
Zaida Perozo, a protester whose body was found on Monday, was wounded along with 20 others in the Plaza Altamira and had been considering testifying against a suspect.
Relatives of those who were killed said they feared more attacks would follow on opposition leaders.
"This is like a chess game," Mr. Pinto said. "First they go after the pawns and then later for top leaders."
Anti-Chavez student tortured by police, says head of Venezuela's central university [Full Text] CARACAS, Venezuela - Secret police tortured a university student who participated in a youth protest against President Hugo Chavez, the rector of the Central University of Venezuela alleged Thursday. A high-ranking official of the Interior Ministry, which oversees the federal secret police, denied the claim. The official spoke only on condition of anonymity.
University Rector Giuseppe Gianetto told Union Radio that 18-year-old Ricardo Sanchez, an international studies major, was kidnapped by agents as he left an opposition youth protest in Caracas on Wednesday. Sanchez was blindfolded, beaten and burned with an object before agents released him early Thursday in a Caracas slum, Gianetto said. Sanchez was under the protective custody of university attorneys who were filing a complaint with the attorney general's office.
"This kind of vile and cowardly torture hasn't been seen in this country for a long time," said Gianetto. "Not even youths can use their constitutional rights to go out and protest peacefully."
"There wasn't any detention of any student," the Interior Ministry official said in a telephone interview.[End]
What is really happening in Venezuela? - To members of the International Media
President Hugo Chavez, speaking at the presidential palace, said he gave secret police the green light to detain Fernandez. "One of the coup plotters was arrested last night. It was about time, and see how the others are running to hide," Chavez triumphed. "I went to bed with a smile." Chavez said judges shouldn't "be afraid to issue arrest warrants against coup-plotters." Government opponents at the rally accused the former paratroop commander of trying to establish a Cuban-style dictatorship in this South American nation of 24 million.
"This is an escalation of violence by the government, which has arrived at the extreme of repression," said Carlos Feijoo, 88, a retired oil worker at the demonstration. "He wants to copy Fidel (Castro)." Government allies warned that more than 100 opposition leaders - ranging from labor bosses to news media executives - who supported a two-month strike to oust Chavez could also be arrested. The work stoppage ended on Feb. 4 in all sectors except the oil industry. "More than one hundred are on the list to be captured," said Luis Velasquez, a ruling party lawmaker. It could not be immediately confirmed if such a list existed. Eight armed secret police agents seized Fernandez at about midnight Wednesday as he was leaving a restaurant in Caracas' trendy Las Mercedes district, said his bodyguard, Juan Carlos Fernandez. He said the men fired in the air when patrons tried to stop them from taking Fernandez.
Fernandez and Carlos Ortega, president of the country's largest labor union, called the strike on Dec. 2 to demand Chavez's resignation and early elections. Fernandez's wife, Sonia, spoke briefly with her husband by telephone and said that he was in good condition at secret police headquarters. Fernandez was meeting with his attorneys, she said.
Ortega was ordered to surrender, also on treason and instigating violence charges, said magistrate Maikel Jose Moreno. The tough-talking labor boss said he wouldn't turn himself in. "We have nothing to fear," Ortega said in a telephone interview with the local Globovision TV channel. "The only one who has a date with justice is the president." ***
From Venezuela, A Counterplot***As Washington prepares a high-stakes military venture in the Persian Gulf, a growing physical threat is being posed by Iraq, Libya and Iran to the soft underbelly of the United States. Hundreds and possibly thousands of agents from rogue Arab nations are working hard to help President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela take control of South America's largest oil industry and create al-Qaeda-friendly terrorist bases just two hours' flying time from Miami.
Arab advisers now are reinforcing a sizable contingent of Cubans in efforts to reorganize Venezuela's security services, assimilate its industries based on totalitarian models and repress a popular opposition movement. "What happens in Venezuela may affect how you fight a war in Iraq," Gen. James Hill of U.S. Southern Command is reported recently to have told his colleague at U.S. Central Command, Gen. Tommy Franks.
"Chavez is planning to coordinate an anti-American strategy with terrorist states," says Venezuela's former ambassador to Libya, Julio Cesar Pineda, who reveals correspondence between the Venezuelan president and Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi about the need to "solidify" ties between liberation movements in the Middle East and Latin America and use oil as an economic weapon.
Exhorting his countrymen to return to their "Arab roots," Chavez has paid state visits to Libya, Iraq and Iran and signed a series of mutual-cooperation treaties with the rogue governments whose operatives now are flooding into Venezuela. There they can blend into an ethnic Arab community estimated at half-a-million.***
Bump!
And those lying leftists, anti-semitic Muslims and their Hollywood pacifist allies like Reiner, Sheen and Sarandon continue to scream that Bush is like Hitler and guys like Saddamn, Chavez & Castro are not that bad and/or are heroes to their people. Grrrr. May those limousine liberals and their poor, downtrodden, "victimized" Islamofacist/socialist pals rot in hell.
Yes indeed!
C'mon, give Bill Clinton a break. I think he just killed 'em, and never tortured 'em. Not a one!
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| Tue Feb 18, 6:34 PM ET |
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A Venezuelan opposition supporter, wearing a Statue of Liberty headdress, shouts slogans against President Hugo Chavez during a demonstration against terrorism in Caracas, February 18, 2003. REUTERS/Jorge Silva |
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