..Surviving a surge in street violence in Venezuela

[Bacchus4.0]

http://news.yahoo.com/surviving-surge-street-violence-venezuela-161725674.html

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That frustration defines this 28-million-person country, which has seen shootings, kidnappings and other crime infiltrate every aspect of daily life. Whole neighborhoods that used to buzz with street life are abandoned at night, while foreign diplomats and working-class Venezuelans alike fall prey to so-called express kidnappings that whisk victims away to the nearest cash machines.

Amid a list of woes, including double-digit inflation and crumbling infrastructure, rampant crime is seen by many as the main failing of the late President Hugo Chavez's government, and one that a whole swath of this shell-shocked country has lost hope of correcting.

Just last week, the U.N. Development Program found that Venezuela suffered the world's fifth highest homicide rate, with 45 out of every 100,000 people killed in 2010, trailing only Honduras, El Salvador, the Ivory Coast and Jamaica. The nonprofit Venezuelan Violence Observatory estimates the homicide rate was much higher last year, at 73 per 100,000 people.

That murder rate has doubled since 1999, when Chavez was first elected president, officials say. And kidnappings increased 26-fold from 1999 to 2011, according to a study by the civic group Active Peace, which studies safety issues.

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Only 9 percent of homicides result in an arrest, according to the nonprofit Venezuela Violence Observatory. And even the government estimates police commit as much a quarter of the country's crimes.





Read the whole article.

[Flatulo]

1. It's all America's fault. nt

[Bacchus4.0]

2. but of course, particularly the 25% of murder victims killed by police n/t

s