Thursday, November 8, 2007

Daily Headlines: November 9, 2007

* Gunmen fired into a crowd of several thousand anti-Chavez protesters in Caracas, officially injuring at least eight people.

* The Iranian government rejected an Interpol detention order issued against five of its citizens accused of a 1994 bombing in Buenos Aires.

* Expletive. Expletive. Expletive.

* U.S. president George W. Bush continues to push Congress to back free trade pacts with several Latin American countries.

Sources (English)- Monsters & Critics, MSNBC, Reuters

Sources (Spanish)- El Tiempo, RCN, El Universal

Image- CNN

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Gunmen fired into a crowd of several thousand anti-Chavez protesters in Caracas, officially injuring at least eight people. "

Nope. Nobody fired into a "crowd of several thousands". The first information that came out was that a group of hooded pro-Chavez gunmen (no evidence of them being Pro-Chavez) were firing from the UCV Social Work building at several opposition students coming back to school from the march. New reports indicate that the situation is "confusing", by which they mean they don't know who started the violence. Pro-Chavez students said that they were putting up signs in favor of the COnstitutional reform inside the school when some of the opposition students coming back from the march started harassing them. Afraid they would be lynched they ran inside the Social Work building at UCV. Why they had guns (maybe for protection?) we don't know at this time. It would behoove you to be better informed before posting wrong information.

By the way, did you know that a couple of days ago two students were killed in protests in Zulia state? The press was spinning it as Chavista violence until it finally surfaced that the gunmen were thugs opposed to the government. I wonder why that didn't have more coverage. Or why it didn't make it into the AP and Reuters round of "important" international news.

Erwin C. said...

Anon-

Could you please provide links to what you claim? It would definitely be very interesting to check out the sources on what you said really happened in Caracas yesterday as well as the incident in Zulia.

Anonymous said...

There you go:


Shootings in Universidad del Zulia:

http://www.aporrealos.org/actualidad/n104142.html
http://www.aporrealos.org/ddhh/n104163.html
http://www.aporrealos.org/ddhh/n104228.html
http://www.bolpress.com/art.php?Cod=2007110404
http://www.radiomundial.com.ve/yvke/noticia.php?892

From a well known opposition paper:

http://www.eluniversal.com/2007/11/04/pol_art_detienen-a-presunto_578642.shtml


Shootings at UCV:

http://caracas.eluniversal.com/2007/11/08/ccs_art_batalla-campal-dentr_584493.shtml
Apparently the opposition students set the Social Work building on fire (!)
http://www.aporrea.org/ddhh/n104400.html
http://www.aporrealos.org/actualidad/n104372.html
http://www.eluniversal.com/2007/11/08/ccs_art_batalla-campal-dentr_584493.shtml
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/venezuela_protest;_ylt=AiYX9Qqp3_SsVDLYfjDlFtZjhuIA

Erwin C. said...

Thank you very much anon.

Hopefully readers can check out those links and get a fuller picture of the situation in Venezuela.

Anonymous said...

More on that:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/7084636.stm

As the BBC says, "it is not clear who started the violence".

Anonymous said...

Yet more on the Chavista-Opposition violence:


http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/2818

It's always good to have the other side's opinion. A this point, I don't think that anybody that really knows what's going on in Venezuela would take "AP photographers" as an unbiased source.

Erwin C. said...

Thanks again for your links, anon.

Funny you should mention bias since the captions on some of the original articles deem the gunmen as pro-Chavez sympathizers. Yet in the pieces the photogs don't mention if that really is the case.

It's hard to believe anyone in this situation.

Anonymous said...

Only one more video, Erwin C:

This shows footage from ibside the Social Work building at UCV. Notice the students inside running in a panic. Those attacking from the outside are members of the opposition (students, mostly).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUhjGZLbb4o&eurl=http://www.oilwars.blogspot.com/