A statement from the mother of a Venezuelan police officer shot dead by a right-wing paramilitary gang as he responded at a gas station that had been put to the torch. The “Guarimbas”, as the violent opposition operations were called, occurred mainly in the more affluent areas of Caracas, but affected mainly working-class people whose jobs were there.

Often this violence was meant to provoke security forces so that their reaction could be recorded and broadcast as if it were unprovoked repression.

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