‘Burn Her Alive’: US Reporter Tells RT About Death Threats From Venezuela Opposition Protesters

A US journalist covering opposition violent protests in Venezuela told RT she received numerous death threats during her work on the ground. She says protesters threatened to lynch and burn her alive if she tried to contradict their narrative.

Abby Martin, the host of the Empire Files investigative program on the pan-Latin American TeleSUR TV network has been reporting on the events of the opposition riots in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas.

Here in the Western press we hear one narrative that [Venezuelan President Nicholas] Maduro’s forces are cracking down and killing en masse peaceful protesters. The reality on the ground is very different. There are tens of thousands of people peacefully protesting either with the government or against the government,” Martin told RT.

However, some protesters are involved into actions called ‘guarimbas’, which means making “giant flaming barricades,” Martin said, adding that by this a small contingent of protesters are “provoking an international response from media and state forces.”

Martin said she saw firsthand what those people do.

“They attack police lines with Molotov cocktails and explosives. And these are the same people who are attacking hospitals, carrying out political assassinations.”

Martin said that what her crew did was “simply reporting on the opposition violence.”

“We just reported on this and the result of this was a <…> lynch mob, death threats. I’ve never had so many death threats in my life. It [the mob] actually calls ‘Lynch her, Lynch her, burn her alive’.”

Martin said she saw mobs at the protests burn alive those people whom they see as infiltrators.
“It’s no small thing to be called an infiltrator. It was extremely scary and dangerous. The second you try to contradict their narrative, they threaten to kill you.”

According to Martin, it is very dangerous to be a state journalist on the ground.
“They [opposition protesters] did threaten me. They asked: ‘Where are you from?’ And I said: ‘I am American.’ They said: ‘Good. Film what the government does to us! Don’t film what we do!”
And threats are being transformed “into real-life actions,” Martin said.

“It’s extremely scary. They don’t want their narrative to be punctured,” she added.

CaribFlame: Abby Martin: ‘Burn Her Alive’: US Reporter Tells RT About Death Threats From Venezuela Opposition Protesters