Venezuelan Army rebels on the run; asking for asylum at  Dominican Republic and Peruvian Embassies

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Elecronic News Posted: Friday, April 25, 2003 By: David Coleman

Rebel Venezuelan Army officers, Captains Alfred and Richard Salazar Bohorquez (brothers) have requested diplomatic asylum at the Dominican Republic embassy in Caracas. It has been revealed that rebel Venezuelan Army officers, Captains Alfred and Richard Salazar Bohorquez (brothers) have requested diplomatic asylum at the Dominican Republic embassy in Caracas.

• In direct disobedience of military orders, both men had joined military and civilian dissidents at the Plaza Altamira rebel HQ last November, joining the opposition's call for the overthrow by whatever means of the Chavez Frias government and Presidency.

The brothers were facing serious charges over their role in the April 11-13 coup d'etat by Dictator-for-a-Day Pedro Carmona Estanga and in an effort to evade their criminal responsibilities have now asked Dominican Republic authorities to provide a convenient bolthole to fell justice.

Captains Alfred and Richard Salazar Bohorquez are generally identified as having been responsible for taking President Hugo Chavez Frias into armed custody on April 11, 2002, and that they had illegally imprisoned the Head of State, first in Military Police cells at the Fuerte Tiuna garrison in Caracas, and later transferred the President to the top-security Turiamo Naval Base on the Caribbean island of La Orchila while the coup d'etat played out in Caracas with the installation of Carmona Estanga and his follow-up decrees to suspend the Constitution, Congress and the Judicial as he secured dictatorial powers.

The Salazar Bohorquez lawyer, Alonso Medina says the fugitive brothers must now wait for red tapes procedures to be formalized in the Dominican Republic, but that Ambassador Ricardo de Moya has already begun a process to concede their political asylum there.

In separate news: As Venezuela's anti-government opposition falls about in general disarray, Peru's Foreign Ministry says that a further two rebel Venezuelan army officers have entered the Peruvian Embassy in Caracas demanding political asylum in their country. While the news comes in parallel with the two offers now fugitive at the Dominican Republic embassy, the Peruvians say there is no connection and that formal procedures have begun and that the unnamed officers will remain under Peruvian diplomatic protection meanwhile.

Since the beginning of the opposition-led Venezuelan political and economic crisis, the Peruvian government has maintained a position in support of democratic progress under the Organization of American States (OAS) seeking a solution through dialogue and negotiation. Nevertheless, Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo had issued critical declarations against President Hugo Chavez Frias which have led to a chill in Peruvian-Venezuelan relations within the Community of Andean Nations (CAN).