Press photographers complain about National Guard attacks

Press photographers engaged in the coverage of a student demonstration in front of the Embassy of Cuba in Caracas appeared on Thursday at the Attorney General Office to file a complaint for the attacks against them by National Guard officers.

The working materials of reporters Edsau Olivares, of daily newspaper El Universal, and Juan Camacho, of News Report, were seized. As they tried to protect their equipment, they were attacked by the troops deployed outside the diplomatic mission.

Oliver Fernández, a journalist with private TV channel Televen, was not at all luckier. For their part, a team of reporters with private TV news channel Globovisión was ordered to clear the way.

Early on Thursday, six students from several Venezuelan universities were detained as they tried to chain themselves to the gate of the Cuban embassy to Venezuela in protest against the information gap concerning the health status of President Hugo Chávez.

The Venezuelan leader has remained in Havana for 67 days without any public appearance, in recovery from a cancer surgery.

Detained students are José Vicente García, University of Táchira; Villca Fernández, Andes University; Daniel Coronel and Ulises Rojas, University of Carabobo; Vanessa Eisig, Andrés Bello Catholic University, and Alexander Tirado, Libertador Experimental Pedagogic University.