Post-vote Venezuela turns violent

Maduro blames deaths on Capriles and his recount demand

Government "Chavista" supporters burn an election poster of opposition presidential candidate Henrique Capriles in Los Teques, on the outskirts of Caracas, Venezuela, Tuesday, April 16, 2013.  President-elect Nicolas Maduro is blaming Capriles for seven deaths that the government says occurred in post-election unrest. The government has provided names of some people it says have been killed by opposition activists but has provided no evidence. Capriles is demanding a vote-by-vote recount of Sunday's presidential election. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Government "Chavista" supporters burn an election poster of opposition presidential candidate Henrique Capriles in Los Teques, on the outskirts of Caracas, Venezuela, Tuesday, April 16, 2013. President-elect Nicolas Maduro is blaming Capriles for seven deaths that the government says occurred in post-election unrest. The government has provided names of some people it says have been killed by opposition activists but has provided no evidence. Capriles is demanding a vote-by-vote recount of Sunday's presidential election. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

CARACAS, Venezuela - President-elect Nicolas Maduro and his opposition rival traded accusations Tuesday over blame for post-election violence that the government said had caused seven deaths and 61 injuries across Venezuela.

Maduro accused the U.S. of fomenting the violence, while opposition candidate Henrique Capriles accused Maduro of creating a smoke screen to divert attention from the opposition’s insistence on a vote-by-vote recount of Sunday’s close election.

In Washington, meanwhile, President Barack Obama’s administration said it is refusing to the accept the official results of the vote without a full recount given the margin of the result: 50.8 percent to 49 percent in Maduro’s favor. The U.S. was joined by the governments of Panama and Paraguay.

Maduro, the chosen heir of the late Hugo Chavez, spent the day on state TV at various events demonizing Capriles as “a murderer” and coup plotter. He also heaped blame on Washington.

“The [U.S.] embassy has financed and led all these violent acts,” Maduro said during a televised meeting at the headquarters of the state oil company.

Earlier, Maduro said he would bar an opposition protest march planned for today in Caracas and blamed Capriles personally for the post-election violence.

“You are responsible for the dead we are mourning,” he said, calling Capriles “the defeated candidate.”

He said he wanted to avoid the kind of violence that preceded a failed April 2002 coup attempt against Chavez that Washington initially recognized. But then Maduroupped the ante, calling on his own supporters to take to the streets today in the capital.

Capriles subsequently called off the opposition march. It was to have converged on the regime-friendly National Electoral Council, which quickly ratified Maduro’s victory Monday.

“Whoever goes out into the street tomorrow is playing the government’s game,” Capriles said. “The government wants there to be deaths in the country.”

According to the electoral council, Maduro won by 262,000 votes out of 14.9 million ballots cast.

Capriles says Chavistas stole the election and provided reporters with some examples.

At 283 polling stations, election monitors were forced to leave before vote counts, some at the point of a gun, he said. At one voting booth in the western state of Trujillo, 717 people voted when only 536 were registered, he said.

People marched in various provincial capitals Tuesday to demand a recount, heeding a call by Capriles. At least one turned violent.

In the capital of Barinas, Chavez’s home state, police and National Guard troops fired tear gas and plastic shotgun pellets at protesters who were marching toward the provincial headquarters of the electoral council. Opposition leaders reported 30 arrests and three minor injuries.

Barinas Gov. Adan Chavez is a brother of Hugo Chavez, who succumbed to cancer March 5 after 14 years as president. The opposition blames Chavez for Venezuela’s economic disarray, chronic and worsening power outages and rampant crime, including one of the world’s highest homicide rates.

Justice Minister Nestor Reverol accused Capriles of numerous crimes, including insurrection and civil disobedience. National Assembly speaker Diosdado Cabello called for a criminal investigation, which he said should include two top Capriles aides: Lara state Gov. Henry Falcon and Carlos Ocariz.

Government officials have kept up a drumbeat of attacks alleging since Monday that Capriles is plotting a coup, including a claim by Maduro that opposition protesters had attacked government health clinics and the house of electoral council President Tibisay Lucena.

Chief prosecutor Luisa Ortega, who announced the death toll, said 135 people had been detained in protests, presumably on Monday, whenCapriles’ supporters protested in Caracas and other cities, including Barinas, Merida and Maracay.

Ortega did not provide identities for the dead and injured or say where the violence occurred. She said the dead belong to the “working class.”

Officials said one death involved a man in the capital who reportedly was shot by opposition supporters in front of a health clinic.

Reverol said other shooting deaths, in the states of Sucre, Tachira and Zulia, were being investigated.

Capriles said the government is to blame for any violence.

“The illegitimate one and his government ordered that there be violence to avoid counting the votes,” Capriles tweeted. “They are responsible!”

In Teques, the seat of the state that Capriles governs, several hundred Chavista militants on motorcycles menaced opposition supporters Tuesday, discouraging a march on the provincial electoral council office.

Some broke a window and tossed a firebomb into an office of the opposition Democratic Party office, causing a small fire. Others used broomsticks to smash display cases at a bakery that they said was owned by a Capriles supporter. They also looted it.

People across the nation banged on pots and pans Tuesday night to demand a recount, just as they did twice Monday at Capriles’ request.

He called for such “cacerolazos” every evening this week until Friday, when he said the cacophony should coincide with Maduro’s scheduled swearing-in.

Information for this article was contributed by Jorge Rueda, Frank Bajak and Christopher Toothaker of The Associated Press.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 04/17/2013