Early-morning car bomb explosion rocks Chevron executive's residential district

www.vheadline.com Posted: Sunday, March 02, 2003 By: David Coleman

Venezuelan CICPC detectives are probing an early morning Sunday car bomb explosion outside the home of controversial cattle livestock producer Antonio Melian at Richamond in western Zulia State causing "considerable damage" in the vicinity.  There have been no reports of  injuries so far.

Explosive experts who have inspected the wreckage since just after daybreak, say that C-4 Semtex explosives were used, similar to the detonations at the Spanish Embassy and the Colombian Consulate last week.  Zulia CICPC director Idelfonso Urdaneta says the vehicles was a red-painted Celebrity which was listed as stolen in Maracaibo from February 17.

Melian is described as a leading activist in Zulia State but his home is also in close proximity with that of the environmental protection manager of US Chevron, who has also been the center of opposition-government debate in the wake of the 2-month nationwide labor-management stoppage which failed in its aim to bring down the Chavez Frias government.

Interviewed on opposition Globovision Channel-33 television news, a neighbor said |one sees this kind of thing all the time in the Middle East where they are in a state of permanent war, but to have the same situation here on our own doorsteps must make everyone stop and think what's happening."