Mother of all marches in Venezuela; Maduro reacts by pledging 500.000 civilian militias

As Venezuela’s center-right opposition prepares to stage the mother of all marches this Wednesday to protest President Nicolas Maduro’s efforts to consolidate power, the besieged leader has called for a countermarch and declared plans to expand the country’s civilian militias.

Maduro, speaking to thousands of uniformed militia members assembled Monday at the presidential palace in Caracas, said they must determine whether they are with the homeland or with the betrayal of the homeland.

The president announced a goal to ramp up their ranks to half a million, from the current 100,000, and to arm each with a gun. On Sunday, he’d ordered military troops to fan out nationwide.

We are going to mobilize, to fight, to continue fighting to prevent any intention of the right to subvert the constitutional order, added Diosdado Cabello, vice president of the ruling United Socialist Party.

The Maduro supporter, a lawmaker in the National Assembly, said he expected about 60,000 motorcyclists to ride in support of the government Wednesday.

At least five people have been killed in two weeks of protests, with security forces firing rubber bullets, tear gas and water cannons. The turbulence erupted after the Venezuelan Supreme Court’s March 30 announcement that it would strip the opposition-controlled National Assembly of its legislative powers. The court – stacked with appointees of Maduro and his predecessor, the late Hugo Chavez – reversed its position in the wake of domestic and international outcries about an attempted power grab.

Thousands of Maduro’s opponents are expected to turn out in the capital Wednesday at 10 a.m. local time to pressure his administration to respect the assembly’s autonomy, schedule long-delayed elections, free political prisoners and restore other democratic norms.

While the main march is planned for Caracas, Unidad Venezuela, a coalition of opposition parties, also is organizing marches in each of the country’s 24 states, according to the group’s Twitter account. Demonstrations also are planned at the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington starting at noon local time.

Venezuela’s defense minister, Vladimir Padrino Lopez, assured Maduro of professional soldiers’ loyalty. And the country’s foreign minister, Delcy Rodríguez, also expressed solidarity with her boss and against outside forces such as the “imperialist” United States.

We will continue defeating them in the international field, Rodríguez tweeted late Monday. There will be no imperial force on Earth that crushes the spirit of the sovereign people of Venezuela.

But the populist government’s opponents also are appealing to military and civilian troops to back their cause.

We know that behind those shields are Venezuelans who accompany us in this struggle for a change, the National Assembly’s president, Julio Borges, said in a tweet Tuesday.

The National Socialist Party has ruled Venezuela for 17 years. Economic pressures have mounted in recent years, especially since the price of oil – Venezuela’s chief export – began falling in 2014. Venezuelans face chronic, severe shortages of food, medicine and other basics in what once was Latin America’s wealthiest country.

Wednesday’s mass protest falls on a significant date for Venezuelans: On April 19, 1810, Venezuelans began their quest for independence from Spain.

Maduro faces intensifying pressure, from internal political foes and from international bodies such as the Organization of American States, to back off from violence. </s> Demonstrators are taking to the streets of Venezuela to protest President Maduro in what is potentially going to become a large scale march

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The latest on opposition and pro-government marches in Venezuela. (all times local):

Rodriguez spoke Wednesday during a visit to the Portuguese capital of Lisbon, referring to dueling opposition and pro-government marches being held the same day in the South American country.

The Cuban official notes that Venezuela is a sovereign state with a democratically elected government.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has accused the U.S. State Department of encouraging Venezuelan opponents to attempting a government overthrow. American officials have rejected such charges in the past.

Opponents of President Nicolas Maduro have called on Venezuelans to take to the streets for what they’ve dubbed the “mother of all marches” against the embattled socialist leader.

Demonstrators are converging from 26 different points spread across the capital to attempt to march downtown to the Ombudsman’s office. It’s a route tens of thousands of angry protesters have attempted a half-dozen times in the past few weeks only to find their progress blocked by light-armored vehicles and a curtain of tear gas and rubber bullets fired by riot police officers.

At least five deaths have been blamed on the strong-armed response to protests that were triggered by the government-stacked Supreme Court’s decision three weeks ago to strip the opposition-controlled congress of its last remaining powers. </s> CARACAS: Police fired tear gas on Saturday (May 20) at thousands of angry protesters marching in Venezuela's capital in the latest show of defiance against unpopular President Nicolas Maduro.

On the 50th straight day of street rallies against Maduro, protesters also erected barricades of tree branches and stones along the highway where an estimated 10,000 people trudged toward the Interior Ministry in the city centre.

In the western city of San Cristobal in Tachira state, an estimated 40,000-plus took to the streets. Maduro this week ordered 2,600 soldiers to Tachira to quell street violence and looting.

In Caracas, demonstrators carried signs that read "#We are millions against the dictatorship" and "#No more dictatorship!"

Protesters blame the socialist Maduro for oil-rich Venezuela's acute economic crisis, marked by shortages of food, medicine and such basics as soap and even toilet paper, and say he is manoeuvring to dodge calls for early elections.

"It's been 50 days of protests. I'm here with my two children, I can't get any milk, I can't get any food," said Mariangel, a 24-year-old businesswoman.

The red, blue and yellow colours of the Venezuelan flag were painted on her face.

Also present were young men carrying makeshift shields of wood and metal and wearing hoods and gas masks.

"This has been a massacre against the people," opposition leader Henrique Capriles said before the march got underway.

"Still, the more repression there is, the more we will resist and fight for Venezuela," said Capriles, one of whose lawyers delivered a report on the Venezuelan crisis Friday to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights after Venezuelan officials "canceled" his passport, preventing him from flying to New York.

Maduro's opponents expressed confidence that the march on Caracas's main motorway would surpass that of Apr 19, the largest so far in seven weeks of demonstrations that have left 47 people dead, hundreds injured, 2,200 detained and some 161 imprisoned by military tribunals.

But so far, Saturday's turnout is nowhere near the hundreds of thousands that marched Apr 19.

On the other side of town, an estimated 2,000 pro-government workers sang and danced as they staged a rival march to show their support for the president's controversial plan to elect a constitutional assembly to rewrite the constitution. Maduro was set to welcome the workers at the Miraflores presidential palace.

Several hundred people rallied in Miami, too, in a show of support for the anti-Maduro movement in Venezuela. Most were Venezuelan or Cuban.

Venezuela is bitterly divided, as locals bridle under all the shortages, soaring inflation - prices could rise by 720 per cent this year, the IMF estimates - and some of the world's highest crime rates.

As protests have turned violent, an increasing number of gunshot wounds have been reported. Federal prosecutors said they are investigating the role of police and military personnel in the incidents.

Some of the shootings took place in Tachira state, near the border with Colombia, where Maduro this week deployed 2,600 soldiers after riots and looting.

Protests have swelled since Maduro called for convening a "popular" assembly to re-write the Venezuelan constitution, with half its members coming from sectors loyal to him.

The opposition says the assembly would allow Maduro to avoid elections. He denies this and has "guaranteed" that presidential elections will be held next year, as required by law.

Maduro insisted Friday that the "popular" assembly would provide a "path to peace, dialogue and consensus," while the opposition, he said, was offering only "violence and death."

Analysts say the opposition's biggest challenge will be to keep their marches peaceful.

Protests succeed only when they are massive and persistent, said Luis Vicente Leon, who heads the Datanalisis polling firm. He warned that when demonstrations turn violent, they "lose impact."

Seven in 10 Venezuelans reject Maduro's leadership, according to private surveys, amid widespread economic devastation aggravated by the drop in the prices of oil - Venezuela's chief revenue source - in 2014.

That has left Maduro heavily dependent on military support.

Opposition protests grew after the country's Supreme Court on Mar 30 assumed some of the functions of the National Assembly.

In Washington, Organization of American States (OAS) head Luis Almagro said that the only way to solve the Venezuelan crisis is for the country to immediately hold general elections.

It is time for "definitive negotiations to agree on terms to reestablish democracy" in Venezuela, Almagro said in a video message.

The high number of fatalities during the protests is the result of "a regime that obstinately refuses to recognise that the only viable exit from the crisis ... is to hold general elections now." </s> CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The Latest on nationwide protests in Venezuela (all times local):

There was an eerie calm on the streets of Caracas early Wednesday ahead of a planned anti-government demonstration seeking to oust President Nicolas Maduro.

Many shops were closed while riot police flanked by water tanks and lightly armored vehicles guarded the emblematic Plaza Venezuela that leads to downtown.

Juan Guaido, the newly-installed leader of congress who called Wednesday's march, urged security forces to stand alongside peaceful protesters.

"The world's eyes are on our homeland today," he said in an early-morning tweet.

Overnight there were reports of unrest in several working-class neighborhoods of Caracas as residents took to the streets to set fire to barricades demanding Maduro's resignation.

Venezuela's re-invigorated opposition faces a crucial test Wednesday as it seeks to fill streets nationwide with protesters in an appeal to the military and the poor to shift loyalties that until recently looked solidly behind President Nicolas Maduro's socialist government.

The protests have been called to coincide with a historic date for Venezuelans — the anniversary of the 1958 coup that overthrew military dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez. Government supporters are also expected to march in downtown Caracas in a rival show of strength.

The competing demonstrations will come after a whirlwind week that saw an uprising by a tiny military unit, fires set during protests in poor neighborhoods and the brief detention by security forces of the newly installed head of the opposition-controlled congress. </s> CARACAS - Venezuela's opposition prepared to march in silence on Saturday to honour a dozen people killed in three weeks of protests demanding that the government of President Nicolas Maduro hold delayed elections and address a growing economic crisis.

Twelve people have been killed in a renewed wave of demonstrations this month in incidents primarily involving security forces or armed civilians. Another eight were electrocuted in a looting incident that took place following a protest. Opposition leaders blame a heavy-handed crackdown by security forces, who have arrested hundreds of people and on several occasions flooded hospitals and clinics with tear gas.

Ruling Socialist Party officials say the demonstrations, in which protesters throw rocks at police and block streets with burning debris, are violent disruptions of public order meant to overthrow the government.

Saturday's protest, however, was to be a silent one out of respect for those who died.

"(The demonstration) today shall be a thundering and historic silence that beats on the conscience of the oppressor," wrote opposition legislator Miguel Pizarro via Twitter. Marches are planned for cities around the country and in the capital Caracas, where the opposition will gather in 20 different places and march to the headquarters of the country's Catholic archdiocese. Anger over the OPEC nation's triple-digit inflation and Soviet-style product shortages boiled over after the government-leaning Supreme Court last month briefly assumed the powers of Congress, triggering accusations that Maduro was building a dictatorship.

The court walked back the measure after international condemnation, but Maduro's government further fueled the protests by barring the opposition's most popular politician, Henrique Capriles, from holding office for 15 years. </s> Tens of thousands of people marched Saturday in the Venezuelan capital and elsewhere in the restive country, facing police tear gas as they protested against the socialist government of President Nicolas Maduro.

Saturday's protests marked the 50th straight day of anti-government street demonstrations, some of which have been accompanied by disorder. Nearly 50 people have been killed.

In Caracas, where many residents face severe shortages of such daily necessities as food, medicine and toilet paper, marchers carried signs — some reading "No More Dictatorship" and "Millions Against Dictatorship" — as they moved toward the city center.

Protesters blame Maduro and his economic policies for soaring inflation and the continuing shortages. They have also demanded fresh elections and freedom for jailed protesters.

Counterdemonstrations have also escalated since Maduro's call earlier this month for a new constitution.

More than 2,000 protesters have been jailed since early April, when the demonstrations began, weeks after Maduro dissolved the National Assembly and lifted lawmakers' immunity from criminal arrest and prosecution. Activists say at least one-third of the detainees remain jailed.

The European Union called on the Maduro government and opposition groups this week to begin an "urgent, constructive and effective dialogue" aimed at resolving the political crisis.

Ahead of Saturday's marches in Caracas and the western city of Cristobal, activists had predicted a gathering in the capital larger than that on April 19, when hundreds of thousands of marchers swept through the city. However, witnesses said the eventual turnout fell well short of last month's showing. </s> CARACAS: More than 200,000 protesters took to the street in Venezuela on Saturday (May 20) on day 50 of an angry and sometimes deadly showdown with unpopular President Nicolas Maduro.

As with many of the previous marches in crisis-hit Venezuela, police fired tear gas as protesters in the capital of the oil rich country suffering from dire shortages of the most basic of goods.

The opposition blames Maduro for the economic mess and wants early elections to replace the Socialist who took over from the late Hugo Chavez. Seven weeks of street protests have left 47 people dead.

In Caracas alone, some 160,000 marched through the city trying to reach the Interior Ministry in the city centre, said Edinson Ferrer, spokesman for the opposition coalition MUD, citing a preliminary estimate.

In the western city of San Cristobal in Tachira state, an estimated 40,000-plus took to the streets. Maduro this week ordered 2,600 soldiers to Tachira to quell street violence and looting.



In Caracas, demonstrators carried signs that read "#We are millions against the dictatorship" and "#No more dictatorship!"



Protesters blame Maduro for Venezuela's acute economic crisis, marked by shortages of food, medicine and such basics as soap and even toilet paper, and say he is maneuvering to dodge calls for early elections.



"It's been 50 days of protests. I'm here with my two children, I can't get any milk, I can't get any food," said Mariangel, a 24-year-old businesswoman.



The red, blue and yellow colours of the Venezuelan flag were painted on her face.



Also present were young men carrying makeshift shields of wood and metal and wearing hoods and gas masks.



"This has been a massacre against the people," opposition leader Henrique Capriles said before the march got underway.



"Still, the more repression there is, the more we will resist and fight for Venezuela," said Capriles, one of whose lawyers delivered a report on the Venezuelan crisis Friday to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights after Venezuelan officials "canceled" his passport, preventing him from flying to New York.



In terms of turnout Saturday's protests came close to the biggest of the seven weeks of protest rallies, when several hundred thousand people came out on April 19. The demonstrations have degenerated into violence which, besides the 47 dead, has left hundreds injured, 2,200 detained and some 161 imprisoned by military tribunals.



On the other side of town, an estimated 2,000 pro-government workers sang and danced as they staged a rival march to show their support for the president's controversial plan to elect a constitutional assembly to rewrite the constitution.



Maduro had been scheduled to welcome the workers at the Miraflores presidential palace, but in the end the marchers did not see the president.



Venezuela is bitterly divided, as locals bridle under all the shortages, soaring inflation - prices could rise by 720 percent this year, the IMF estimates - and some of the world's highest crime rates.



As protests have turned violent, an increasing number of gunshot wounds have been reported. Federal prosecutors said they are investigating the role of police and military personnel in the incidents.

Some of the shootings took place in Tachira state, near the border with Colombia, where Maduro this week deployed 2,600 soldiers after riots and looting.



Protests have swelled since Maduro called for convening a "popular" assembly to rewrite the Venezuelan constitution, with half its members coming from sectors loyal to him.



The opposition says the assembly would allow Maduro to avoid elections. He denies this and has "guaranteed" that presidential elections will be held next year, as required by law.



Maduro insisted Friday that the "popular" assembly would provide a "path to peace, dialogue and consensus," while the opposition, he said, was offering only "violence and death."



Analysts say the opposition's biggest challenge will be to keep their marches peaceful.

Protests succeed only when they are massive and persistent, said Luis Vicente Leon, who heads the Datanalisis polling firm. He warned that when demonstrations turn violent, they "lose impact."



Seven in 10 Venezuelans reject Maduro's leadership, according to private surveys, amid widespread economic devastation aggravated by the drop in the prices of oil - Venezuela's chief revenue source - in 2014.



That has left Maduro heavily dependent on military support.



Opposition protests grew after the country's Supreme Court on Mar 30 assumed some of the functions of the National Assembly. </s> The march called the “taking of Caracas” aims to pressure electoral authorities to allow a recall referendum against Maduro this year.

The buildup to the protest has been tense, with Maduro’s government jailing several prominent activists, deploying security forces across the city and warning of bloodshed.

Maduro this week repeatedly accused his opponents of plotting violence during the march to pave the way for a coup such as the one that briefly toppled his late predecessor Hugo Chavez in 2002. He said authorities had arrested people possessing military fatigues and C4 explosives, and who had plans to fire upon the crowds dressed as national guard members. He didn’t say who he believed was behind the alleged coup plan.

“If they’re coming with coups, ambushes and political violence, the revolutionary will provide an uncommon and overwhelming response,” Maduro told supporters on Tuesday.

Rather than dampening Venezuelans’ enthusiasm, the “war-like” rhetoric appears to be energizing the opposition, said Dimitris Pantoulas, a political analyst from Caracas.

Had the government minimized the protest’s importance it would have likely failed to garner much support, he said. Better-off Venezuelans who are the opposition’s political bedrock are on summer vacation and those less privileged are too busy standing in long lines for food and coping with the oil economy’s collapse to engage in the heady ideological street battles of the kind that marked the early days of Chavez’s rule 16 years ago.

“The government made a big mistake by throwing fuel onto the flames,” said Pantoulas.

Shortly after dawn Thursday, a few hundred people dressed in the yellow, red and blue colors of Venezuela’s flag began walking toward the three large avenues in eastern Caracas where demonstrators were to concentrate after midday.

Some held signs saying “I revoke,” a terse way of expressing support for the move to end Maduro’s mandate as president.

Among those taking part in the march, which organizers are hoping will draw 1 million people, are some 100 members of the Piaroa and Jiwi indigenous tribes. They arrived in Caracas on Wednesday for the protest after travelling more than 375 miles — by foot, canoe and bus — from the Amazon rainforest.

“We came to see if they’ll free the political prisoners,” said Miguelina Caballero through an interpreter. She was referring to someone from her Piaroa tribe who had been jailed for alleged fraud during December’s congressional elections, a case the government used to disqualify three indigenous leaders from taking seats in the opposition-controlled legislature.

But delivering on their big promises won’t be easy for Maduro’s opponents.

The opposition has staged a half-dozen or so marches this year, some of which ended in clouds of tear gas as hard-core activists clashed with riot police, but posed no major risk to Maduro’s grip on power. Even the anti-government protests in 2014 that were blamed for more than 40 deaths failed to rally the huge numbers now sought for Thursday’s march by the hard-to-keep together Democratic Unity alliance.

The opposition hopes to force electoral authorities widely seen as pro-government to allow a recall vote this year. If Maduro loses, new elections would be held and polls indicate the opposition would win. But if a vote is delayed until after Jan. 10, and Maduro loses, his vice president would finish his term ending in 2019.

Electoral authorities have yet to set the date for the next stage of the complex process, in which the opposition must collect 4 million signatures over three days, with a referendum vote scheduled only once the signatures are validated.

The government plans a counter protest on Thursday, but Pantoulas said authorities will have a tougher time rallying supporters among the poor amid 700 percent inflation blamed for growing hunger and a collapse in wages.

“I don’t know that the poor will join opposition march, but they’re not going to partake in the counter-protest,” said Pantoulas. “The fact that the poor barrios won’t be supporting Chavismo is enough to damage the government.”

Also invigorating the opposition is a government crackdown.

Authorities over the weekend moved a prominent opposition leader, former San Cristobal Mayor Daniel Ceballos, from house arrest back to prison while he awaits trial on civil rebellion charges stemming from the 2014 protests. Authorities said he was plotting to flee and carry out violence during the protests.

Two other activists, Yon Goicoechea and Carlos Melo, were also detained this week, with a top socialist leader accusing Goicoechea of carrying explosives.

There have been more subtle threats as well. Government workers say they’ve suffered retaliation for signing petitions seeking Maduro’s removal and the opposition-leaning newspaper El Nacional said thugs threw excrement and Molotov cocktails at its building Tuesday.

The U.S. State Department accused Maduro of trying to bully Venezuelans from taking part in the march. </s> After a peaceful protest on the weekend went uncontested by Venezuelan authorities, civilians are poised to ramp up their demonstrations on Monday.

Thousands of protesters dressed in white marched into the west of Venezuela's capital on Saturday- an act likened to 'crossing the Berlin Wall' - in reaction to the deaths of 20 people during anti-government riots.

Three weeks of constant protests have involved violent clashes between the people of Caracas and riot police, and after a short respite over the weekend, things look set to turn ugly once more.

Civilians are being urged by the opposition to the government to flood the streets and block off the roads in order to grind the country to a halt.

Experts have previously said that under-fire President Nicolas Maduro will remain in power as long as Venezuelan's poorest citizens do not rise up.

One of the opposition leaders, Henrique Capriles, urged the crowd 'to keep coming out into the streets - this isn't the time to give up, it's a time to resist.'

The opposition plans to return to a more confrontational strategy on Monday, when it is calling for Venezuelans to block roads in a bid to grind the country to a halt.

Its leaders blame Maduro for the unraveling of oil giant Venezuela's once-booming economy, which has left the country with shortages of food, medicine and basic goods.

The spark that set off the near-daily protests was an attempt by the Supreme Court to take over the powers of the opposition-dominated Congress.

Although it partly reversed course after an international outcry, the move fueled widespread indignation in Venezuela that was heightened when an order came down barring Capriles from political office.

It will be a far cry from the weekend when demonstrators - who have called for elections and measures to halt the economic freefall which has engulfed the South American nation - dressed in white in honour of the 20 protesters who have died in clashes with police in the past month.

Opposition lawmaker Freddy Guevara likened the march toward some of the city's more humble neighborhoods as 'crossing the Berlin wall'.

Dressed in white, Venezuelan protesters opposed to President Maduro marched in silence in several cities on Saturday to pay respects to 20 people killed in three weeks of unrest.

The silent protest saw opposition leaders march with their arms wrapped around each other, having vowed to continue protests until their call for elections are granted.

They were joined in protest by Spaniards in Puerta del Sol square, in Madrid, Spain, where people gathered in their droves to show solidarity.

Unlike demonstrations in recent days, the rallies in Caracas, Maracaibo, Barquisimeto and San Cristobal passed with no major violence reported between protesters and police.

A few minor scuffles briefly broke out in the east of the capital when police forced back the crowd with tear gas. A female journalist said she was assaulted by pro-government heavies downtown and a male journalist was detained for hours by intelligence officers, their union said.

For the first time since the turmoil in the streets started at the beginning of April, the demonstrators were able to cross Caracas, including several districts loyal to Maduro and his late predecessor Hugo Chavez.

Tense negotiations saw security forces who had been blocking their way step aside to allow them to march to their destination, the headquarters of the Catholic bishops' conference.

Protesters also marched to the Catholic Church's episcopal seats in several other cities across the country, tightly guarded by the police and national guard.

The opposition is seen as close to the Church, which the government accuses of playing politics against it.

The 'silent protest' was a test of the authorities' tolerance for peaceful demonstrations.

The center-right opposition has accused the leftist government of repressing past protests and sending armed thugs to attack them.

Many wore white T-shirts emblazoned with the word 'peace.' Others carried white flowers or Venezuelan flags, while one protester wielded a giant wooden cross.

In Caracas, a priest and an evangelical pastor led a mass for the demonstrators from the back of a truck.

Some of the protesters said they were not afraid of the government.

'We've got nothing left to lose. The government's already taken everything, all possibility of living our lives with dignity,' said protester Jessica Muchacho, 33.

'The government has to back down, it has to listen to the people,' said a protesting lawyer, Rosibel Torres.

A sociologist, Francisco Coello, predicted that 'the people will continue to protest,' demanding early elections.

On Thursday, protests descended into a night of clashes, riots and looting that left 12 people dead in Caracas. More pockets of violence erupted Friday night.

'It was like a war,' said Carlos Yanez, a resident of the El Valle neighborhood in southwestern Caracas, where 11 people were killed.

The two sides blame each other for the unrest.

Maduro, the heir of the leftist 'Bolivarian revolution' launched by the late Hugo Chavez in 1999, says the protests are part of a US-backed coup plot.

Pressure on the socialist president has been mounting since 2014, when prices for Venezuela's crucial oil exports started to plunge.

According to pollster Venebarometro, seven in 10 Venezuelans disapprove of Maduro, whose term does not end until 2019.

The secretary general of the Organization of American States, Luis Almagro - one of Maduro's harshest critics - accused the government of cowardice.

'When the political leadership gives the order to open fire on its own people, that's a very strong signal of cowardice and weakness,' he said.

A dozen people died in unrest on Friday during overnight clashes and looting. Victims of violence in the past month have included protesters and bystanders struck by gunfire.

Most of the deaths took place in El Valle, a working class neighborhood near Caracas' biggest military base where opposition leaders say a group of people were hit with an electrical current while trying to loot a bakery protected by an electric fence.

Two days of massive protests on the streets of Caracas spilled into a violent night in several parts of the city, with residents in El Valle witnessing repetitive gunfire, street barricades set aflame and more than a dozen businesses looted.

Amid the confusion, mothers and newborn children had to be evacuated from a maternity hospital named after the late leader Hugo Chavez when it was swamped with tear gas.

Opposition leaders blamed the government for repressing protesters with tear gas but standing idly by as businesses were looted. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez pointed the finger at the opposition, saying armed groups controlled by them were responsible for the attack at the hospital.

'We reject and do not accept those irresponsible declarations,' said Henrique Capriles, a former presidential candidate who the government recently barred from running for public office.
Venezuelans continue their march against President Nicolás Maduro with thousands flocking into the streets of Caracas for a second day.