CARACAS:

a jail riot in Venezuela's Portuguesa state has left a minimum of 47 dead and 75 wounded in western Venezuela, a country where NGOs and inmates' families regularly denounce unsanitary conditions, violence and overcrowding behind bars.
The Venezuelan Prison Observatory (OVP) rights group provided the figures for the riot, which happened Friday afternoon at the Los Llanos prison center in Guanare city. Parl

                                            Image taken from www.thenews.com.pk
commentary Deputy Maria Beatriz Martinez, who represents Portuguesa state where the prison is found, said: "At the moment we have got been able to confirm 47 dead and 75 wounded." Martinez and so the NGO said all of the dead were detainees. According to a military report on Friday, the disruption started when inmates began destroying "the security fences around the perimeter" in an exceedingly "massive escape attempt.

" It also said the prison's director was wounded. Martinez refuted that account, stating the uprising was staged by a bunch of prisoners "because they did not have access to food." According to OVP, guards opened fire following the incident at the power, which has a capacity for 750 inmates but houses some 2,500. With the coronavirus pandemic raging, visits from family and friends — who often bring food and medicine to inmates — are greatly reduced.

"What is happening directly is due to the guards. they are doing not transfer the food" brought by families to the inmates, Yessica Jimenez, who knows someone inside the prison, told AFP. The identities of those killed were verified "through the morgue, because of relatives who recognized the dead in photos that were shown to them on a computer," said Carolina Giron of OVP. She added inmates' family and friends "don't have access to the hospital.

" According to the organization, 97 deaths occurred in Venezuelan prisons last year, 70 percent of which were due to diseases like tuberculosis and a scarcity of medication. More than 330 cases of coronavirus, including 10 deaths, are recorded in Venezuela, but authorities say there are not any cases within the country's jails. Opposition leader Juan Guaido has refuted Venezuela's official count, accusing the government. of Socialist President Nicolas Maduro of "shamelessly lying." The initial toll Friday from the riot was 17 dead and nine wounded.