Llaguno Overpass events

Llaguno Overpass events
View from the Llaguno Overpass down to Baralt Avenue.
Lead figures

 • Pro-government demonstrators  • National Guard  • Bolivarian Circles

 • Anti-government demonstrators  • Metropolitan Police

Casualties and losses
19 dead
127 injured

The Llaguno Overpass (Puente Llaguno in Spanish), also known as the Llaguno Bridge, is a bridge in central Caracas, Venezuela, near the Miraflores Palace, made infamous by the events of 11 April 2002, when snipers opened fire upon the crowd of protestors marching on the overpass, also known as El Silencio Massacre, causing 19 deaths and 127 injured people. The events preceded the 2002 Venezuelan coup attempt. The military high command refused Hugo Chávez's order to implement the Plan Ávila as a response to protests against him, a military contingency plan by the army to maintain public order last used in 1989 during The Caracazo, and demanded him to resign.[1] President Chávez was subsequently arrested by the military.[2][3][4] Chávez's request for asylum in Cuba was denied, and he was ordered to be tried in a Venezuelan court.[5]

  1. ^ Nelson, Brian A. (2009). The silence and the scorpion : the coup against Chávez and the making of modern Venezuela (online ed.). New York: Nation Books. pp. 23–25. ISBN 978-1568584188.
  2. ^ "Esposa de Gebauer espera publicación en Gaceta de Ley de Amnistía". El Universal (in Spanish). 2 January 2008. Retrieved 31 January 2010. Otto Gebauer fue imputado por el delito de insubordinación y privación ilegítima de libertad al coronel Hugo Chávez Frías,
  3. ^ "Veneconomía" (PDF) (in Spanish). 15 March 2006. Retrieved 29 January 2010.
  4. ^ Rey, J. C. (2002), "Consideraciones políticas sobre un insólito golpe de Estado" Archived 3 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine, pp. 1–16; cited in Cannon (2004:296); "In 2002, Venezuela's military and some of its business leaders ousted President Chavez from power and held him hostage." (N. Scott Cole (2007), "Hugo Chavez and President Bush's credibility gap: The struggle against US democracy promotion", International Political Science Review, 28(4), p498)
  5. ^ Bellos, Alex (15 April 2002). "Chavez rises from very peculiar coup". The Guardian. Retrieved 8 February 2015.