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News > Venezuela

Venezuela: Claims Of Hospital Deaths During Outage: 'False'

  • Venezuela's Communications and Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez at a press conference at Miraflores Palace in Caracas, Venezuela October 17, 2018.

    Venezuela's Communications and Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez at a press conference at Miraflores Palace in Caracas, Venezuela October 17, 2018. | Photo: Reuters

Published 10 March 2019
Opinion

Venezuelan Communication Minister Jorge Rodriguez says there were no hospital deaths due to outage because a backup generator system provided energy. 

Venezuelan Communication and Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez says it is “false” that there were 79 deaths in hospitals across Venezuela as a result of the country's electrical attack as many mainstream media are reporting.

RELATED: 
Venezuela Denounces US Participation in Electric Sabotage

“Seventy nine deaths. This is false,” declared Rodriguez in a Friday press conference.

“This is false because President Maduro already had already installed a generator system in all hospitals knowing that this type of energy attack could occur,” said the minister. 

Hospital administrators at the public General Hospital Lidice told teleSUR correspondents the hospital experienced no blackout because the generator system kicked in when the electrical system went down two days ago.

"When the light went out the electrical generator was automatically activated," a hospital doctor told teleSUR.

“They didn’t know we had a generator system set up to prevent from happening everything they are saying has happened,” Rodriguez said referring to the widely ciruculating claim by mainstream media outlets that 79 people died within the first day of the sabotage on the Venezuelan electrical system.

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio tweeted about the energy event just minutes after it happened, indicating he had prior knowledge of the outage.

The auto-controlled Guri system that supplies the country with energy was attacked by factions in the U.S., including Senator Rubio, said Rodriguez Friday.

United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was poised to fuel the flames of the major outage tweeting Friday: "There is no food, there are no medicines, now there is no energy," and added that Maduro would be next to fall.

Rodriguez reiterated to the press that a United Nations Human Rights delegation was being sent by commissioner Michelle Bachelet. He assured reporters that the Maduro administration would show delegates “the confessions” of those who caused the nearly nationwide blackout that is being restored.

“We will bring to her the confessions of these criminals so the world can call for human rights in Venezuela,” said Rodriguez, adding “if there is any international rule of law we have to denoucnce this type of barbarity.”

The communications minister ended by saying: "An essential human right is the right to peace ... Mr. Rubio, Bolton, Abrhams - we have the right to peace!"

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