Supporters of Bolivia’s ex-president Evo Morales stormed a barracks within the central Chapare area and took about 20 troopers hostage, navy sources mentioned on Friday, marking a dramatic escalation of their standoff with the state.
The hostage scenario comes almost three weeks after backers of Morales – the nation’s first Indigenous chief – started blocking roads to forestall his arrest on what he calls trumped-up rape prices geared toward thwarting his political comeback.
Morales, 65, was in workplace from 2006 to 2019, when he resigned beneath strain from the navy after elections marked by allegations of fraud.
Bolivia’s armed forces mentioned on Friday in a press release that “irregular armed teams” had “kidnapped navy personnel” and seized weapons and ammunition within the Chapare.
A navy supply informed AFP on situation of anonymity that “about 20” troopers have been taken hostage.
In a video broadcast by Bolivian media, 16 troopers have been seen surrounded by protesters holding pointed sticks aloft.
“The Cacique Maraza Regiment has been taken over by Tipnis activists. They’ve reduce off our water, electrical energy and are conserving us hostage,” a uniformed man is heard saying within the video.
Tipnis is an Indigenous stronghold of Morales’s.
Regardless of being barred from operating once more, Morales desires to problem his former ally turned rival President Luis Arce for the nomination of the leftwing Mas occasion within the nation’s August 2025 presidential election.
Days after Morales led a march of hundreds of primarily Indigenous Bolivians on the executive capital La Paz to protest in opposition to Arce’s insurance policies, prosecutors introduced he was beneath investigation for rape, human trafficking and human smuggling over his alleged relationship with a 15-year-old lady in 2015.
Morales, who’s accused of fathering a daughter with the lady, has referred to as the accusations “a lie”.
On Wednesday, Arce demanded an “speedy” finish to the roadblocks and mentioned the federal government would “train its constitutional powers to safeguard the pursuits of the Bolivian folks” if the protesters didn’t comply.
His warning was interpreted by some Bolivians as a risk to make use of the navy to finish the blockade, which has induced widespread meals and gasoline shortages and prompted costs of primary items to soar.
The Chapare is the place Morales claimed he was the sufferer of an assassination try final week that he blamed on state brokers.
In a video he shared on social media, he’s seen travelling in a pickup truck riddled with bullet holes close to the town of Cochabamba.
The federal government mentioned police fired on the car after coming beneath hearth from Morales’s convoy at a checkpoint set as much as fight drug trafficking within the Chapare, one of many nation’s primary coca-growing areas.
Morales, a former coca grower, was extraordinarily well-liked till he tried to bypass the structure and search a fourth time period.
His supporters initially demanded an finish to what they referred to as his “judicial persecution”, however the protest motion has snowballed right into a wider anti-government revolt marked by requires Arce to resign.
Morales’s supporters, who’ve vowed to not budge from the barricades, blame Arce for a pointy rise in meals and gasoline costs and shortages that pre-date the protests.
At the very least 61 cops and 9 civilians have been injured in clashes between the protesters and safety forces in latest days.
Arce has estimated the financial price of the blockades at greater than $1.7bn (£1.3bn).
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