Venezuelan activists called for fresh protests on Saturday after at least 41 people were arrested as street battles raged between security forces and protesters angry at the policies of the country's leftist government. Three weeks of violent protests against President Nicolas Maduro's government have left 18 dead in the oil-rich nation, according to government figures, and the crisis showed little sign of abating.
National Guard security forces blasted the student-led demonstrators in the city's wealthy Chacao district late Friday with high-pressure water, and fired tear gas canisters in an attempt to break up the crowd. Hooded protesters set up barricades and responded with a steady barrage of Molotov cocktails. With no sign of a breakthrough in the crisis gripping the oil-rich country, Washington urged Maduro to talk to the protesters.
"They need to reach out and have a dialogue, and bring people together and resolve their problems," Secretary of State John Kerry said in Washington Friday, urging against "arrests and violence in the streets." Kerry said the United States was working with Colombia and other countries to bolster mediation efforts. Maduro has labelled the protests that began on February 4 a Washington-backed attempted "coup."
He claims that radical opposition leaders have joined students angered by high inflation and goods shortage in plotting to topple his nearly year-old government. At least 41 protesters were arrested during the latest rally in Caracas, eight of whom were foreigners "and are being held for international terrorism," state VTV television said in a brief statement.
Venezuela's journalist association SNTP said that one of the foreigners was US freelance reporter Andrew Rosati, who writes for the Miami Herald. Rosati was detained for half an hour and released after being "struck in the face and his abdomen" by security forces, the SNTP, said on Twitter. Also detained and released was a team of journalists from the Associated Press, the SNTP said. The SNTP also said that Italian photographer Francesca Commissari, who works for the local daily El Nacional, was being held.
Government officials released no details on the arrest of foreigners. Leaders of the most activist wing of the opposition - including legislator Maria Corina Machado and members of Popular Will party, led by jailed ex-mayor Leopoldo Lopez - called for nationwide protests Saturday against "repression, torture and persecution." Popular Will said that an arrest warrant was issued for Carlos Vecchio, the party's national political co-ordinator, accused of crimes linked to the protests that include arson and criminal damage. Lopez turned himself in last week after a warrant went out for his arrest, and his wife is active leading protests seeking his release.
The fresh arrest warrant and the clashes added fuel to the protests that had begun to flag after the government decreed several days of holidays to mark the start of carnival season. In a separate incident, Maduro said that National Guard members were "ambushed" and shot at while removing debris from the streets of Valencia, Venezuela's economic hub. One died from a shot in the eye and another was shot twice in the leg.
"Justice must prevail against implacable murderers and those preparing paramilitary groups... to hide behind alleged protests and seek civil war." Protest organiser Alfredo Romero, president of the Venezuelan Penal Forum, said 33 cases of "cruel and inhuman treatment or torture" have been reported to the public ombudsman.
One of the cases involves an alleged rape with a rifle of a young man arrested by the National Guard. The Venezuelan government said it was investigating 27 cases of human rights abuses, though it provided no details of possible wrongdoing. Some of the deaths have been attributed to violent clashes with police, but other victims have been shot by unidentified gunmen, whom the protesters have accused of being government agents.
The government has denied all links to such killings. Attorney General Luisa Ortega Diaz said that the death toll linked to the protests stood at 18, while of the 1,044 that had been detained, 72 remain behind bars. The US Congress has condemned "inexcusable" violence against anti-government protesters, calling for a dialogue to end the crisis and urging President Barack Obama to impose sanctions on those responsible for the crackdown.