Weekend Economists (Heart) the 4th Estate February 22-24, 2014

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48. Venezuela Opposition Agrees to Talks With Maduro as Unrest Grows

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-23/venezuela-opposition-agrees-to-talks-with-maduro-as-unrest-grows.html

Venezuela’s opposition agreed to meet tomorrow with President Nicolas Maduro as anti-government protesters and security forces clashed in Caracas for an 11th straight night.

Governor Henrique Capriles, standing alongside the wife of jailed opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez, said at a rally yesterday he would agree to hold talks with Maduro at the presidential palace on Feb. 24. The two-time presidential hopeful two days prior said he wouldn’t be forced into dialog after Maduro warned there would be legal consequences to missing the meeting.

“We don’t want confrontation, we want solutions,” Capriles, who lost to Maduro in April elections by the narrowest margin in 45 years, said at the rally in Caracas. “The government of Nicolas Maduro that we are seeing is a historic error, but we can’t get out of this mistake by making another one.”

Anti-government demonstrations are in their second week after Lopez’s Voluntad Popular party on Feb. 12 organized marches to speak out against rising crime, the world’s fastest inflation and shortages of everything from milk to medicine. The protests have turned violent on a nightly basis as police clash with students, resulting in at least eight deaths.