Campesino Leader Assassinated in Carabobo State, Authorities Blame Landowners

Campesino Leader Assassinated in Carabobo State, Authorities Blame Landowners

By Lucas Koerner

Caracas, June 16, 2015 (venezuelanalysis.com) - Venezuelan campesino leader Roberto Carrera was shot dead in northwestern Carabobo State on Saturday. He is the latest victim of assassins hired by large landowners to put down demands for agrarian reform, according to national authorities. The 36-year champion of campesino land rights died Saturday morning after being shot three times in the back from a pickup truck outside his mother's house in the municipality of Los Guayos.

Carrera, a founding member of the National Political Council of the leftwing political party REDES and a recently named representative to Presidential Campesino Council, fought tirelessly for the redistribution of idle land under Venezuela's revolutionary Land Law.

According to Juan Barreto, national spokesman for REDES, Carrera was assassinated for exposing big landowners unwilling to comply with national land reform statutes.

"This viciously murdered leader was denouncing the landowners of Carabobo, those land hoarders, and together with a group of campesinos, Carrera was threatened with death for merely denouncing these killers."

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