Venezuelan 14-year-old shot dead during anti-government protest

A 14-year old Venezuelan schoolboy has died after being shot in the head during an anti-government protest in the country’s restive western region.

Preliminary investigations suggest the boy, named variously as Kluiverth or Kluiver Roa, was injured during a confrontation between police and protesters in the city, and died on the way to the hospital, according to the San Cristóbal Human Rights Commission president, José Vicente García.

A photo of the middle school student lying in a pool of blood, his backpack hanging over his shoulder, as a man frantically tries to staunch the bleeding was widely shared on social media around the South American country on Tuesday afternoon.

The head of citizen security for the state told reporters that circumstances of the boy’s death were still unclear. “At one point these hooded protesters intercepted four police officers, snatched their motorbikes and to get rid of the protesters, one of the officials shot at the ground,” Colonel Ramón Cabezas told reporters.


http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/24/venezuelan-14-year-old-shot-dead-anti-government-protest