'Put down your weapon': pressure from residents leads military personnel to help with rescues in Venezuela

Volunteers and Ecuadorian firefighters from the Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) search for bodies at the site of a building that collapsed in Caraballeda, La Guaira state.
Juan Barreto / AFP
A protest by residents forced this Sunday (28) a group of soldiers to pick up pickaxes and shovels and participate in the removal of the rubble from a collapsed building, four days after the earthquakes in Venezuela that have already caused almost 1,500 deaths.
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"The country needs you. Put down your gun, drop the bullets", an indignant man shouts at a soldier in the region of Tanaguarena, in the state of La Guaira, the epicenter of the tragedy, AFP journalists found.
Dozens of people working on rescue operations in a building destroyed by the strong earthquakes that hit Venezuela on Wednesday (24), confronted a group of around 20 soldiers who were only there providing security.
Alexander Mijares, a 26-year-old businessman who had gone as a volunteer to help in the search for a friend who was trapped in that place, explained to AFP the reason for his outburst of indignation.
"They were leaning against a wall when we had to remove a person who was dead, and they were calmly standing in a corner", she reported.
Survivor tells how she managed to be rescued from the rubble in Venezuela
"Why didn't they bring them with work overalls? Why didn't they bring them with shovels and pickaxes? "They exist to defend a country," he added.
Next to him, a group of people also shouted against the military. "My children are not going to be thrown into a mass grave," complained another man in one of the buildings in Tanaguarena, exasperated by the delay in rescuing the bodies.
In light of the protest, the military picked up tools and began removing the rubble.
The military has been a privileged sector during the governments of Hugo Chávez (1999-2013) and his successor, Nicolás Maduro. Pillar of power in Venezuela, the Armed Forces are also seen as an instrument of repression.
Rescue teams and volunteers search for possible victims in Caraballeda, state of La Guaira.
Maurício Valenzuela / AFP

Source: G1