Venezuela using Iranian style suppression of demonsterators

WFB:

Observers say Venezuela’s security situation is spiraling “absolutely out of control” as socialist President Nicolas Maduro continues to crack down on pro-democracy protesters who have taken to the streets to demand that he resign.

Protests in Venezuela entered their sixth day on Monday with students and other demonstrators braving violent attacks from state police and pro-Maduro militias, according to former and current U.S. officials.

Maduro has even employed Iranian-style paramilitary Basij militias in a bid to quell the violence, according to Roger Noriega, a former United States ambassador and assistant secretary of state for western hemisphere affairs.

“They’ve used it to control the population and pretend this is not the state [using violence], but a confrontation between protesters,” he explained. “The reality is in addition to those motorized forces, they have militias and hundreds of thousands of people with arms. The security situation is absolutely out of control.”

The Obama administration remained silent about the violence until Saturday, when Secretary of State John Kerry cautiously called for “calm.”

“We call on the Venezuelan government to provide the political space necessary for meaningful dialogue with the Venezuelan people and to release detained protesters,” Kerry said in a statement on Saturday, after having avoided public comment for days. “We urge all parties to work to restore calm and refrain from violence.”

As the protests grow, current and former U.S. government officials slammed the Obama administration for being overly cautious and afraid to take on Venezuela’s socialist government, which expelled three U.S. diplomats from the country late Sunday.
...

Venezuela has been acting like an Iranian client state in this Hemisphere.  It is increasing a despotic regime trying to suppress the people who are in the midst of a general uprising over the incompetence of this government.