Bolivian Rulers “Assure Military Impunity” While Death Toll Rises – Report

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – According to reports, members of the security forces who “participate in operations to restore order and public safety are exempt from criminal responsibility if they act in the performance of their constitutional duties of legitimate defense or in an emergency”.

They may also “use all available means proportionate to the risks of the operation”. This “grave decree” violates international human rights conventions, promotes violent repression and “breaches the obligation of states to investigate, prosecute, convict and punish human rights violations,” according to the CIDH.

According to the country’s ombudsman, the number of fatalities caused by police and military action against coca farmers on Friday in Sacaba near the town of Cochabamba has risen to at least nine and more than 100 people have been injured.

Security officials claim demonstrators tried to break through a police and military security cordon to get to Cochabamba. They had been seized with homemade weapons, machetes, shotguns, and explosives.

Nelson Cox, a representative of the ombudsman’s office, said: “There was no confrontation, but rather an attack by the police and the military on the civilian population. The coca farmers were protesting the coup against President Evo Morales, demanding the resignation of Senator Jeanine Añez, who has appointed herself interim president with a new government.

In view of the unrest in Bolivia, its president in exile in Mexico, Evo Morales, has once again called for dialogue and international mediation.

Morales recalled that exactly 238 years ago Tupac Katari, the leader of an uprising by indigenous peasants in the area of present-day Bolivia against the Spanish colonial power, was murdered. Legend has it that Tupac Katari said, ‘You can kill me, but I will return a million times’.

Áñez has warned Morales that when he returns to the country he will have to answer to the courts for electoral fraud. However, four weeks after the presidential elections, no documented evidence of the alleged electoral fraud to justify the coup has yet been made publicly available.

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