At least 23 dead in clash between gangs and Venezuelan police

At least 23 died over the weekend in a clash between police and gangs in Venezuela’s capital Caracas, according to news reports and human rights activists.

The bloodshed began on Friday afternoon with an operation by two police units - the Special Action Forces, known as FAES, and the Special Tactical Operations Units, known as UOTE - in the gang-ridden neighborhood of La Vega. It continued into Saturday, activist Marino Alvarado wrote on Twitter.

“It is, as far as I recall, the ‘citizen security’ operation with the largest quantity of victims,” said Alvarado, who is affiliated with the PROVEA rights group.

There did not appear to be any police deaths from the confrontations, according to Alvarado, other activists and a report in Ultimas Noticias, a newspaper seen as close to the ruling socialist party.

Venezuela is among the world’s most violent countries, with a murder rate of some 45.6 per 100,000 residents in 2020, according to the nonprofit Venezuelan Observatory of Violence.

The United Nations has attributed crime to the poor political and economic environment in the country, which has the second highest murder rate in the world.

Most crime in Venezuela remains unpunished according to Venezuela's Prosecutor General’s Office, with 98% of crimes in Venezuela not resulting in prosecution.

In spite of significant socioeconomic problems, the murder rate in Venezuela decreased between 2017 and 2020. Venezuela's murder rate decreased from 92 per capita in 2016 to 81.4 in 2018, according to the Venezuelan Violence Observatory (OVV), due in part to criminals joining millions of other Venezuelans in fleeing the country. The murder rate declined even further to 60.3 in 2019 and 45.6 in 2020.

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