Caracas
\nVenezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said he was \u201cmore determined than ever\u201d after he escaped an \u201cassassination\u201d attempt using an explosive-laden drone as he gave a speech during a Caracas military parade. The government said seven soldiers were wounded in the alleged attack today, blamed on Colombia by Maduro and later claimed by a mysterious rebel group.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am fine, I am alive, and after this attack I\u2019m more determined than ever to follow the path of the revolution,\u201d Maduro said defiantly of the incident, from which he escaped unharmed.<\/p>\n
\u201cJustice! Maximum punishment! And there will be no forgiveness,\u201d he warned in an address to the nation, sparking fears of an anti-opposition offensive in a country already reportedly holding some 248 political prisoners.<\/p>\n
Venezuelan state television images showed Maduro looking up disconcertedly in the middle of a speech having heard a bang, before members of the country\u2019s National Guard lined up in the parade suddenly scattered.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was an attack to kill me, they tried to assassinate me today,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Communication Minister Jorge Rodriguez said there was \u201can explosive charge. detonated close to the presidential podium\u201d and in several other spots along the parade held in central Caracas. Saab said he saw a drone filming the event explode.<\/p>\n
No drones could be seen in the television broadcast, which showed bodyguards jumping in front of Maduro to protect him with flexible ballistic shields. The broadcast was quickly cut.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, a policeman said drones may have been released from a nearby apartment that suffered a fire after one exploded. However, other versions of events attributed the fire to the accidental explosion of a gas cylinder.<\/p>\n
The government pointed the blame at \u201cthe ultra-right wing\u201d, its term for the opposition. But Maduro himself said: \u201cI have no doubt that the name (outgoing Colombian President) Juan Manuel Santos is behind this attack.\u201d He added investigations pointed to financial backers who \u201clive in the US, in the state of Florida.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Caracas Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said he was \u201cmore determined than ever\u201d after he escaped an \u201cassassination\u201d attempt using an explosive-laden drone as he gave a speech during a Caracas military parade. The government said seven soldiers were wounded in the alleged attack today, blamed on Colombia by Maduro and later claimed by a mysterious […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38445,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38446,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38444\/revisions\/38446"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}