Jailed Venezuelan opposition leader goes on trial

[Zorra]

9. Good! It's generally always a wise decision to lock up hard core RW extremists when they promote

and instigate violence. With the alarming, rapid rise of militant RW groups in the US, Russia, France, and other nations around the world, other countries may want to follow the example of Venezuela and stop the violence of their local (but often foreign funded) RW extremists, before it's too late to stop their destructive madness.

Opposition Candidate Leopoldo Lopez: A Corrupt “Pretty Boy” with Extremist Credentials

Leopoldo Lopez Mendoza comes from one of Venezuela’s wealthiest families and is known for his “good-boy” looks and extreme right-wing agenda. Lopez has been an anti-Chavez media favorite for his “heroic” negation of a decision by Venezuela’s Comptroller General barring him from holding office until 2014 for acts of corruption committed while he was mayor of Caracas municipality Chacao and during his time as a state employee of PDVSA.
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As a young adult, Lopez received his higher education in the United States. Starting out at Ohio’s Kenyon College, where he studied economics, the opposition candidate went on to obtain a Master’s in Public Policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School for Government. Upon returning to Venezuela, Lopez spent three years (1996-1999) working at state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), at which time he is said to have “stolen money and trafficked influences” in order to finance a right-wing startup political party named Primero Justicia or Justice First.
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Celebrating their violent takeover of the Venezuelan presidency, Lopez and others in the Venezuelan opposition went on to sign the “Carmona Decree”, dissolving all of the country’s democratic institutions including its National Assembly, Supreme
Court, Attorney General, and Public Defender.

Fortunately for Venezuelan democracy, mass demonstrations on behalf of President Chavez brought an end to the coup less than 48-hours after it began. According to investigative journalist Eva Golinger, Lopez is one of several Primero Justicia members who “made frequent trips to Washington during the pre-coup period to visit IRI(International Republican Institute) headquarters and meet with officials in the Bush administration”. IRI, with funding from the US State Department, became a principal financier and advisor to Lopez’s party and the coup planners.

http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/6750