Venezuela News: Easter Protests In Caracas Call For ‘Resurrection’ Of Democracy

Opposition protestors clashed with police in Caracas on Easter Sunday during a series of demonstrations, calling for the “resurrection” of democracy in Venezuela and burning effigies of president Nicolás Maduro and other government leaders. Demonstrators described the actions to El Tiempo as the symbolic “burning of Judas,” an annual tradition -- part of a long and robust tradition in Venezuela of street protests -- timed to correspond with the Easter holiday which sees residents airing out their grievances against public figures by burning images of them.

The demonstrations were centered in the eastern district of Chacao, the upscale neighborhood where anti-government protest have been fiercest and where Leopoldo López -- who faces 17 years in prison for his role as an organizer -- was once a mayor with the conservative Popular Will party. That same party organized Easter Sunday’s protests, according to Al Jazeera, with María Corina Machado -- the lawmaker recently stripped of her seat in Parliament -- and Caracas municipal mayor Antonio Ledezma reportedly participating. The Popular Will party has refused to join dialogues between the Maduro-led government and the opposition coalition Democratic Unity Roundtable. It has sought to push Maduro from office through a strategy of continual and disruptive protests; the government denounces them as “coup leaders.”

Hundreds marched down main arteries of the district until they reached the offices of the UN Development Programme, where a group of students remain camped out in a protest which has lasted for over a month. On the outskirts of Chacao, members of the police and national guard clashed with protestors who launched stones and flaming objects at the authorities, who responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons in an attempt to clear barricades set up in the street. Four people were reported injured. Over 600 have been injured and 41 killed over the course of the protests since they spread to cities across Venezuela in mid-February. Thousands have been arrested, of whom about 175 remain in detention.