UN report: Venezuela death squads kill young men, stage scenes
aljazeera.com/news/2019/07/report-venezuela-death-squads-kill-young-men-stage-scenes-190704170704105.html
4 Jul 2019
Venezuelan security forces are sending death squads to murder young men and stage the scenes to make it look like the victims resisted arrest, a new UN report said.
Government figures showed deaths ascribed to criminals resisting arrest numbered 5,287 last year and 1,569 by May 19 this year. The report, issued on Thursday by United Nations human rights chief Michelle Bachelet, decried a "shockingly high" number of extrajudicial killings.
Families of 20 men described how masked men dressed in black from Venezuela's Special Action Forces (FAES) arrived in black pick-up trucks without licence plates. Witnesses said the death squads broke into houses, took belongings, and assaulted women and girls, sometimes stripping them naked.
"They would separate young men from other family members before shooting them," the UN report said.
"In every case, witnesses reported how FAES manipulated the crime scene and evidence. They would plant arms and drugs and fire their weapons against the walls or in the air to suggest a confrontation and to show the victim had 'resisted authority'," it added.
The report - which drew on 558 victim accounts, witnesses of violence and other sources - said the killings were part of a strategy by the government of President Nicolas Maduro aimed at "neutralising, repressing and criminalising political opponents and people critical of the government".
Interviewees consistently referred to FAES as a "death squad" or "extermination group". NGOs say it is responsible for hundreds of killings.
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