- Title: Maduro condemns acts of violence after National Assembly attack
- Date: 5th July 2017
- Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) VENEZUELAN PRESIDENT, NICOLAS MADURO, SAYING: "I have been informed that during this important, brilliant, beautiful civil military event celebrating total independence, there have been some strange occurrences - always strange when the opposition is involved. At the door and some of the hallways of the National Assembly, in its gardens, there were incidents of unrest and violence. I absolutely condemn these acts. Where as I understand it at this time, I am never going to be an accomplice of a single act of violence. I condemn them, and I have ordered an investigation so that justice will prevail. I want peace, I want peace in Venezuela, I don't accept harm done to anybody."
- Embargoed: 19th July 2017 22:18
- Keywords: Venezuela military parade Independence Day Nicolas Maduro
- Location: CARACAS, VENEZUELA
- City: CARACAS, VENEZUELA
- Country: Venezuela
- Topics: Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA0036OFZBK7
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text:Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro stopped short of blaming an attack on the National Assembly on government groups from the left or the right during a speech at a Venezuelan Independence Day march in Caracas on Wednesday (July 5).
Pipe-wielding government supporters burst into Venezuela's opposition-controlled congress earlier on Wednesday (July 5), witnesses said, attacking lawmakers and journalists in the latest flare-up of violence during the ongoing political crisis.
They injured at least three opposition lawmakers who stumbled bloodied and dazed around the assembly's corridors, witnesses and lawmakers said. Maduro described the raid as part of a series of recent "strange occurrences" on Venezuelan government buildings and said he condemned such acts of violence. Maduro told supporters at the parade that he would "never" be an accomplice in a "single act of violence." He ordered an investigation into the indecent.
Hours after the raid, by late afternoon, a crowd of roughly 100 people was still besieging the building, trapping people inside, witnesses said. Some of those outside brandished pistols and some shouted they would cut water and power supplies.
Maduro spoke from a military parade to celebrate the 206th anniversary of Venezuela's independence in Caracas. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2017. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
- Usage Terms/Restrictions: None