Explosive drone attack aimed at Maduro fails

CARACAS, Venezuela — Authorities detained six people suspected of using explosives-laden drones in a failed bid to assassinate Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, officials said Sunday, in what one witness described as a terrifying attack that shook her apartment building.

The government alleged that opposition factions conspired with assailants in Miami and Bogota. Opposition leaders decried Maduro for broadly singling out his political opponents, and they warned he may use it to suppress his critics.

The thwarted attack comes as Venezuela is reeling from a worsening economic and humanitarian crisis and Maduro has grown increasingly isolated. Foreign nations, including the United States, are slapping economic sanctions against a growing list of high-ranking officials and decrying his government as an autocratic regime.

The assailants flew two drones each packed with 2.2 pounds of C-4 plastic explosive toward Maduro, his wife and other top leaders as he spoke Saturday at an event celebrating the 81st anniversary of the National Guard, said Interior Minister Nestor Reverol. One of the drones was to explode above the president while the other was to detonate directly in front of him, he added.

But the military managed to knock one of the drones off-course electronically and the other crashed into apartment building two blocks away from where Maduro was speaking to the hundreds of troops, Reverol said.