More protests against closure of TV station in Venezuela

May 29, 2007, 16:39 GMT

Caracas - Venezuelan students demonstrated again on Tuesday against the refusal to renew the broadcasting licence of private Radio Caracas Television (RCTV).

On Tuesday morning, several hundred demonstrators blocked off one of the most important highways in Caracas and wreaked havoc in traffic, the daily El Nacional said.

On Monday, at least 10 students were injured in clashes with security forces. National Guard units fired tear gas on students at several colleges in Caracas and Valencia, and national media reported that some of the injured also had bullet wounds.

Demonstrations were held at several areas in the capital to protest authoritarian President Hugo Chavez's refusal to renew the licence of RCTV.

The station was shut down overnight Monday and replaced by a new, government-controlled channel, Televisora Venezolana Social (Teves), which began broadcasting almost immediately.

Interior Minister Pedro Carreno said the students are letting themselves be used by 'forces ready for a coup.'

Left-wing populist Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez justified his government's decision not to renew RCTV's licence by recalling that the popular TV station supported the short-lived coup that briefly removed him from power in 2002.

Chile's governing Socialist Party compared the closure of RCTV to the censorship during Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship (1973-90). The governments of Peru, Colombia and Mexico have also criticized the refusal to renew the licence.

In several Latin American countries, television stations interrupted their programmes for several minutes in protest for the closure of RCTV. Baltazar Cardozo - archbishop of Merida, in Venezuela - compared Chavez's media policy to those of Hitler and Mussolini.