Bolivian Police Attack La Paz Police Intelligence HQ
Dissenting Bolivian police officers have vandalized their own intelligence headquarters in the city of La Paz on Friday in opposition to low wages as the average officer earns just $194 a month.
As military anti-riot forces dealt with the large group of police in civilian clothes, the protesting officers burned documents and furniture as others took to the roof to display their arsenal of weaponry to the opposing forces.
The demonstrations are a nation wide issue as an estimated 4,000 of the nearly 28,000 police officers in the country have begun to occupy the barracks. Though the lower level officers used property damage and other intimidation tactics to further their cause, police commanders did not participate in the direct actions against their government.
The demonstrations began on Thursday when an estimated 30 police officers and their spouses commandeered an elite unit’s barracks just a few hundred feet from the presidential palace.
President Evo Morales, who was holed up in the palace during the mutiny, has not yet commented on the situation. The president remains guarded by machine gun wielding military personal.
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