Riots in Asunción corner Paraguayan President Abdo Benítez

Violence took to the streets of Paraguay, particularly in the Asunción area. Police forces on Friday dispersed a large group of people demonstrating in front of Congress in the historic centre of the capital in protest against the government of Mario Abdo Benítez's handling of the COVID-19 health crisis.

The anti-riot police used tear gas and, according to some sources, rubber bullets against the demonstrators who, according to various sources, wanted to peacefully demonstrate their opposition to the way in which the South American country's government is dealing with the pandemic. 

Before the latest serious incidents, people had been demonstrating in front of Congress, carrying Paraguayan flags and calling for the resignation of the country's president, the head of the conservative Colorado Party.

According to the police, deployed in front of the Congress building, their officers responded in the way they did after some of the groups of demonstrators tried to overstep the established limits. Another police source said that some of the people reportedly threw stones at the officers.

Some of the groups of demonstrators dispersed to other streets in the centre, while the incidents continued. Some local media reported that up to twenty people were injured, although this was not officially confirmed at first. 

The citizens' gathering began peacefully at around 18:00 local time, with a large number of young demonstrators, all with their national flags and protest banners in front of the Congress.

As darkness fell, the peaceful atmosphere was changed by the presence of some citizens lighting bonfires and flares, increasingly closer to one of the main police barriers, behind which riot police and special intervention forces were also stationed. 

This group of demonstrators began to throw stones and objects at the security forces, who after several minutes responded to the attacks with gas and rubber bullets, according to some sources. 

The crowd dispersed in different directions and barricades and bonfires were formed in different parts of Asunción. The most conflictive was the one organised in front of the Ministry of Finance, very close to the National Police Headquarters.

Despite the large number of police officers in the area, they were outnumbered by the demonstrators and there were confrontations with stone throwing. 

The superiority of the citizens forced the police officers to give in and accede to their request to return in front of Congress to begin a vigil until Abdo Benítez resigns.

The protest was organised through social networks to show that they were fed up with the government, with the emphasis on the management of the pandemic. All this after representatives of the nursing sector and patients' families held protests to denounce the lack of resources and medical materials in public hospitals, and after the teaching sector took to the streets to demonstrate for the return to classes in the midst of an escalation of contagions. These protests led to the resignation of the Minister of Health, Julio Mazzoleni. 

Another of the citizens' complaints concerns the delay in the arrival of vaccines, which for the moment are limited to the 4,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine that have already been administered, although only to those working in the health sector. Mazzoleni admitted that he could not give exact dates for the receipt of the one million Russian vaccines already negotiated, as well as the 4.3 million doses agreed with the COVAX mechanism.

Paraguay, a South American country of seven million people, has had more than 3,250 deaths and more than 164,000 cases of the coronavirus since the pandemic broke out. 

These violent incidents in the demonstration against the government of Mario Abdo Benítez for its handling of the pandemic have given the opposition reason to push for an impeachment trial against the leader of the conservative Colorado Party.

After the consequences of the clashes between demonstrators and the forces of law and order became known, spokespersons from different parties, from the opposition Liberal Party to Honor Colorado, the internal faction of the Colorado Party led by former president Horacio Cartes, expressed their desire for President Mario Abdo Benítez to leave office. 

Abdo Benítez already came close to impeachment in August 2019, when he had barely been in office for a year, over a secret agreement with Brazil on the purchase of energy from the Itaipú dam, shared by both countries, although he managed to save himself thanks to the support of Cartes, an internal rival within his own political party. 

More than a year later, the president is facing strong criticism for the way he has fought the pandemic, a major example of which was this Friday's demonstration in front of Congress in protest at the lack of resources for the public health network.