 |
LATIN AMERICA |
| |
Militia Threats Shut Down Venezuelan Border
Towns
CARACAS – Threatening leaflets attributed to
Colombian paramilitaries shut down
businesses on the western border of Tachira
state, where military units have been posted
in three municipalities, Venezuelan
authorities said.
Col. Juan Rosales, a member of the regional
military command, told the press that
numerous shops had been closed as a result
of the threats.
Placed under arrest were five suspected
distributors of leaflets that read “the time
for social cleansing has come,” Rosales
said.
He also said that, as a form of prevention,
military forces had occupied the
municipalities of Bolivar, Ureña and Junin,
all close to the Colombian border.
Both the military authorities and the
regional directors of Venezuela’s
Fedecamaras business federation pointed to
the paramilitaries as the source of the
threats.
Rumors were also rife that paramilitaries
had shown up at a number of schools in towns
near the border to suspend classes and send
the kids home.
It remains unclear if these acts are related
to the recent murder of nine Colombians, a
Peruvian and a Venezuelan in the region.
The victims, who met to play a friendly
soccer match, were kidnapped Oct. 11 and
their bodies found last week.
The region on the border with Colombia is
one of the most insecure in Venezuela with
its convergence of guerrillas, right-wing
paramilitaries, drug traffickers, kidnappers
and killers-for-hire. EFE
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
