venezuela Tensions on The rise
TWO KILLED, CLASHES ERUPT AS TENSE STANDOFF OVER AID SHIPMENT CONTINUES
President Nicolas Maduro’s security forces fired teargas and rubber bullets on a crowd awaiting the distribution of humanitarian aid at the Venezuela Colombia border
Venezuela’s National Guard fired tear gas on residents clearing a barricaded border bridge to Colombia on Saturday, heightening tensions over blocked humanitarian aid that opposition leader Juan Guaido has vowed to bring into the country despite President Nicolas Maduro’s defiant refusal to accept assistance.
The opposition is calling on masses of Venezuelans to escort trucks carrying the nearly 200 metric tonnes of emergency food and medical supplies sent largely by the United States over the last two weeks across several border bridges.
But clashes started at dawn in the Venezuelan border town of Urena, when residents began removing yellow metal barricades and barbed wire blocking the Francisco de Paula Santander bridge.
Venezuela’s National Guard responded forcefully, firing tear gas on the protesters, some of them masked youth throwing rocks, who demanded that the aid pass through.
Earlier, violence broke out at a Venezuelan town near the border with Brazil, leaving two people dead and 17 others injured, local authorities said.
Meanwhile, Colombian migration authorities said four National Guardsmen at another crossing deserted their posts and asked for help.
There was no immediate word on their rank, but a video provided by Colombian authorities shows three of the men wading through a crowd with their assault rifles and pistols held above their heads in a sign of surrender. The young soldiers were then ordered to lay face down on the ground as migration officials urged angry onlookers to keep a safe distance.
“I’ve spent days thinking about this,” said one of the soldiers, whose identity was not immediately known.
The potentially volatile moment for both Venezuela’s government and opposition comes exactly one month after Guaido, a 35-year-old lawmaker, declared himself interim president based on a controversial reading of the constitution before a sea of cheering supporters.
While he has earned popular
I told her I had to go out on the streets because there’s no bread. But still, these soldiers are scary. It’s like they’re hunting us. Andreina Montanez, A Venezuelan mother
backing from over 50 nations, he has not sealed the support of the military, whose loyalty to Maduro is crucial. Before daybreak on Saturday, national guardsmen in riot gear forced people to move away from the road leading to the Simon Bolivar bridge connecting Venezuela and Colombia. The Venezuelan government had said that it was closing three of its bridges on the border. “We’re tired. There’s no work, nothing,” Andreina Montanez, 31, said as she sat on a curb crying from the tear gas.
A single mom, she said she lost her job as a seamstress in December and had to console her 10-year-old daughter’s fears that she would be left orphaned when she decided to join Saturday’s protest. “I told her I had to go out on the streets because there’s no bread,” she said. “But still, these soldiers are scary. It’s like they’re hunting us.” Guaido and the presidents of Colombia and Chile gathered at the Tienditas bridge where they were expected to address the media before setting out to deliver the aid.
International leaders including United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres are appealing for the sides to avoid violence.
But on Friday, a member of an indigenous tribe was killed and 22 others injured in clashes with security forces who enforced Maduro’s orders to keep the aid out at a crossing with Brazil. —