BOLIVIA: Bolivia's government and right-wing rivals yesterday sought to defuse a deep political crisis after deadly protests prompted martial law in one restive northern province where nearly 30 people were killed.
Mario Cossio, governor of natural gas-rich Tarija province, said he would travel to La Paz for a second round of talks with the government and urged president Evo Morales to take part personally. Mr Morales' spokesman said he might.
Bolivia, an unstable country rich in natural gas at the heart of South America, has been rocked in the past week as supporters of right-wing opposition governors stepped up their rejection of Mr Morales' plans for deep, socialist reforms.
Mr Morales has said his opponents want to oust him.
Opposition protest leader and wealthy pro-autonomy businessman Branko Marinkovic said his followers would end roadblocks that have crippled eastern Santa Cruz province to help foster negotiation.
Defence minister Walker San Miguel said the army patrolled Cobija, capital of sparsely populated Pando province in the Amazon near Brazil, before dawn, two days after Mr Morales declared martial law.
Cobija was quiet at midday yesterday with shops closed. Troops guarded the airport and a barracks. An aide to Pando's governor, a foe of Mr Morales, denied the army was in control of Cobija.
Troops continued to find bodies from a Thursday fight in Pando between mostly pro-government peasant farmers and backers of Mr Morales' right-wing opponents.
"We are nearing the 30 mark," said Alfredo Rada, government minister for the province of 60,000 people.
Mr Morales accused backers of Pando's opposition governor, Leopoldo Fernandez, of ordering a massacre and the government has vowed to arrest him.
Mr Fernandez denied the charge. He said he had been talking to representatives of human rights groups, but accused the government of stopping them from visiting him.
Tarija's Mr Cossio said the opposition governors would ask Chilean president Michelle Bachelet to allow them to attend a presidential summit in Santiago on Monday of the Union of South American Nations to discuss Bolivia. Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and president Hugo Chávez of Venezuela were to attend.
Addressing a crowd of thousands in Cochabamba in the poor Andean nation's coca-growing heartland, Mr Morales accused the right-wing governors of plotting against him and defied them by vowing to introduce divisive reforms. - (Reuters)