La Paz.- Tuesday's massacre occurred in the town of El Alto, near the capital of La Paz, where protesters had been blocking a major fuel plant for days. Police and military forces deployed helicopters and armored vehicles to the protest site. Witnesses say a military unit then opened fire on protesters, killing at least five young men. The massacre follows a weekend massacre near Cochabamba, where security forces killed at least nine demonstrators.

Screams of pain tonight in El Alto following another massacre carried out by the security forces under Bolivia's coup government in Senkata. Families of victims and residents say there is a deliberate cover-up. pic.twitter.com/GikfRKC2UJ

— Camila (@camilateleSUR) November 20, 2019

Meanwhile, Germany has secured access to Bolivia's vast reservoir of lithium, a key raw material used to produce cellphones and electric car batteries. Shortly before his ouster, Bolivian President Evo Morales said he planned to cancel the agreement with Germany. But the right-wing government of self-declared President Jeanine Áñez now says the mining deal will move forward. Bolivia's Potosí region is home to over 50% of the world's lithium reserves.

EVO MORALES CONDEMNS DICTATORSHIP AT NEWS CONFERENCE IN MEXICO CITY

Mexico City.- At a press conference held in Mexico City, Bolivia's President-in-exile Evo Morales on Wednesday analyzed the latest consequences of the coup d'etat that allowed opposition senator Jeanine Añez to proclaim herself as interim president.

Here is our story from El Alto today https://t.co/PreYUwtnQ3

— Tom Phillips (@tomphillipsin) November 20, 2019

The Movement to Socialism (MAS) leader began by highlighting that the victims of the repression carried out by the Police and the Army have increased over the last week. "After the coup, they have killed about 30 people. This massacre is part of genocide in our beloved Bolivia," Morales said and stressed: "They are killing my brothers and sisters."

Morales then presented a video in which the number of people killed, in different places and different dates, was detailed. Bolivia's president-in-exile also warned that right-wing groups are trying to hide information about their fascist violence by stealing corpses and manipulating autopsies.

Part 1 of 2: The people of #Bolivia have spoken!

Our friend, @WyattReed13, captured this powerful video outside of a hospital in El Alto, where wounded protesters are being treated after yesterday's massacre at #Senkata.#BoliviaMassacre#BoliviaGolpeDeEstado#HandsOffBolivia pic.twitter.com/WTLm1aSSxn

— CODEPINK (@codepink) November 21, 2019

Morales recalled that during his administration, no one was shot dead until the day of his resignation; however, "now, we've seen how helicopters fire at people who are defending democracy."

Meanwhile, Bolivia's military-coup government was posting messages stating that "our military avoided a great tragedy and prevented thousands of El Alto people from dying."​​​​​​​ This paradoxical interpretation of what happened in Senkata on Tuesday, however, is part of a broader political strategy against Evo Morales and his supporters.

Bolivia: Organised Indigenous communities from North Potosí enter Senkata, El Alto today in repudiation of yesterday's repression and massacre carried out under the coup administration. @teleSURenglish pic.twitter.com/Fsq1fDPmae

— Camila (@camilateleSUR) November 20, 2019

The Añez administration on Wednesday announced that it will file an international complaint against Evo Morales for "crimes against humanity." Besides being blamed for organizing road blockades to prevent food from reaching several cities, the Indigenous leader is being accused of an alleged "possible" bomb attack at the Senkata refinery. All these ​​​​​​​"destabilizing actions" would have been planned by Morales from Mexico and using his phone.​​​​​​​

In a new effort to halt chaos in the Andean country, the Socialist senator Efrain Chambi on Wednesday presented "the Exceptional and Transitional Bill for National and Subnational Elections," which was referred to the Constitution Commission for its analysis.

This happened shortly after the self-proclaimed president Áñez threatened again to call elections through a decree, which would constitute a new rupture of the Bolivian constitution and laws. On the calling for new elections, Morales said that "everything for peace" is admissible, although he also recalled that he won in the first round; therefore he invited the international community to conduct a new audit of the electoral results.

Regarding accusations that he would be fostering terrorism, the MAS leader said he did not know the details of the legal actions against him, which the Añez administration is or will be fostering.

Nevertheless, after recalling the experience of the Bolivian popular struggle in the 1980s and 1990s, Morales pointed out that such misleading practices "are typical of dictatorships."

Bolivia's president-in exile ended his press conference in Mexico City asking the international community not to support the coup d'etat, that is, not be behave like the Organization of American States (OAS).

"International organizations should support the most humble and poor people," Morales said and stressed that "we will democratically recover political power, as usual." (RHC)

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