A Reuters Article that Might help Prevent Political Violence in Venezuela
A Reuters Article that Might help Prevent Political Violence in Venezuela
By Joe Emersberger at May 15, 2013
A Reuters article from May 8 (Recriminations over post-vote violence stoke Venezuela tensions) does something that the international press has barely ever done in Venezuela. It actually quoted family members of the people killed by opposition supporters. According to the Maduro government, nine people were killed by Capriles supporters following the April 15 presidential election that Nicolas Maduro won by only 1.5 percentage points.
Reuters interviewed family members of three of the nine victims named by the government. The article stated, in part
In La Limonera, a "socialist city" Chavez created last year to house some 430 poor families in new tower-blocks, there is outrage at the violence and fear of more. Residents on motorcycles and soldiers now patrol the area, surrounded by middle-class homes.
"You may not agree with me, but you have no right to shoot me, set off rockets, or bang pots and pans every night while my kids are trying to sleep," said Oscar Canizales, 21, a resident who patrols on motorcycle.
~snip~
You would never guess it from reading international press coverage, but the majority of Venezuelans killed in political violence since 1998 have been victimized by violent elements of the opposition. Hundreds of peasants alone have been killed since 2001 in crimes that implicate wealthy land owners vehemently opposed to land reform. It has taken media activism to get the liberal press to mention this at all.
This Reuters article is therefore deserving of praise despite its flaws. The victims of US allies are very rarely acknowledged as statistics, much less as real people with loved ones who remember them.
http://www.zcommunications.org/a-reuters-article-that-might-help-prevent-political-violence-in-venezuela-by-joe-emersberger
= new reply since forum marked as read
Kudos to Reuters for doing that. Add that to the category of "Things the opposition wants people to forget"... Like Ruth Capriles sending out [link: 2002, Ruth Capriles envió mensajes SMS afirmando la supuesta presencia de armas en la Embajada de Cuba|SMS messages] and whipping up opposition crowds telling them that there were weapons hidden inside the Cuban Embassy. Or how in 2013 one of their journalists sent people to the Cuban clinics to attack them by totally fabricating a deliberate lie that the Cubans were hiding ballots there.
Ruth Capriles, April 11 2002, the night before the coup:
Nelson Bocarando in 2013:
...
"From a Toyota, someone starting shooting and shouting opposition slogans. One of the bullets hit my mother in the back," said 15-year-old Yonylexis Reyes, who lives with two brothers in a small apartment decorated with the posters with the faces of Maduro and Chavez.
Can you imagine getting yourself ready to leave your house and go out in public to lie your ass off like that?
Jesus H. Christ.
I thought about this unavoidably obvious duplication of tactics earlier. It looks just as grotesque now, after having more time for it to marinate. Low down, and filthy dirty. Sub-sub-standard behavior for adults.
Ugly, ugly people.
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Ruth Capriles[/center]
