Venezuelan authorities hunt police pilot and part-time film actor behind helicopter attack on Supreme Court

The country has been rocked by several months of protests

The Venezuelan authorities said they are hunting a police pilot and part-time movie actor who is suspected of having used a helicopter to launch a grenade attack on the Supreme Court in what President Nicolas Maduro called an assault by “terrorists”.

Reports said Oscar Perez had gone into hiding after carrying out the attack on the nation’s highest court and its interior ministry, firing a total of 15 bullets and dropping four grenades on the buildings, which were occupied at the time.

In a video message posted on social media, Mr Perez described himself and those supporting him, as a “coalition of military and police officers” concerned about the actions of the “criminal government”.

“We have two choices: be judged tomorrow by our conscience and the people or begin today to free ourselves from this corrupt government,” he said, reading from a manifesto in front of four figures dressed in military fatigues and wearing ski masks.

Mr Maduro, who had been speaking live on state television when the incident happened on Tuesday evening, was quick to condemn the incident as the latest attempt to wrest power from his elected government. There were no reports of injuries.

“Sooner rather than later, we are going to capture the helicopter and those behind this armed terrorist attack against the institutions of the country,” he said. “They could have caused dozens of deaths.”

There was no sign on Wednesday of Mr Perez, who was described by state officials as a “psychopath,” though police sources claimed the helicopter was dumped in Higuerote, on the Caribbean coast.

Yet many opponents of the Venezuelan leader quickly claimed on social media the incident had been planned by Mr Maduro himself in order to justify a crackdown against those seeking to block his plans to rewrite the constitution.

The government accused the policemen of links to the CIA and to Miguel Rodriguez, a former interior minister and intelligence chief under Mr Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chavez, who recently broke with the government.

“I'm not at all convinced by the helicopter incident,” Mr Rodriguez told Reuters.“Conclusion: a cheap show. Who gains from this? Only Nicolas for two reasons: to give credibility to his coup d'etat talk, and to blame Rodriguez,” he added, referring to himself.

For the last three months, Venezuela has been increasingly rocked by antigovernment protests. At least 76 people have died in the unrest since April, the latest a 25-year-old man shot in the head near a protest in the Petare slum of Caracas, authorities said.

Hundreds more people have been injured and arrested in what Maduro terms an ongoing coup attempt with US encouragement.

Demonstrators are demanding fresh elections, measures to alleviate a stark economic crisis, and freedom for hundreds of jailed opposition activists.

Mr Maduro, who was elected in the spring of 2013, took over from the controversial Mr Chavez, after his death from cancer. For many years, Mr Chavez was a hero to many on the left as he invested in social programmes using the country's oil wealth.

As his rule continued, however, others accused him of becoming increasingly authoritarian and of failing to diversify the country’s economy. The US supported enemies of Mr Chavez, who briefly ousted him in a 2002 couple and Washington channelled hundreds of thousands of dollars to his opponents via the so-called National Endowment for Democracy.

Mr Maduro wants a July 30 vote for a special super-body called a Constituent Assembly, which could rewrite the national charter and supersede other institutions such as the opposition-controlled congress. He has suggested that the assembly is a way to calm the country, but his opponents want to bring forward the next presidential election, scheduled for late 2018.

Mark Weisbrot, a regional expert and director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, told The Independent he feared the country could end up heading to a civil war. He said the only solution was a negotiation and election that carried guarantees for both sides.

“The country is highly polarised. Most people seem to think it’s just a mass uprising against an unpopular dictator,” he said. “But there are 140,00 in the military and 300,000 in armed militias. It’s a violent place.”

Adding to the tinder-box atmosphere, Venezuelan opposition supporters again took to the streets on Wednesday, to block roads around the nation with barricades.

In Caracas, security forces fired tear gas at some groups of protesters, while elsewhere demonstrators stood in the roads waving banners and chanting slogans under drizzle.

However, there seemed to be little enthusiasm for the pilot Mr Perez. “It's a joke. How many people have been arrested for raising a flag? Yet someone who takes a helicopter, gets away,” Gary Guillen, told Reuters as he was walking down a Caracas street. “This sounds more like government tactics than anything else.”

Information Minister Ernesto Villegas said the security forces had been deployed to apprehend Mr Perez as well as recover the stolen German-built Bolkow helicopter. Photographs of the pilot standing in front of the US Capitol in Washington and a US Coast Guard helicopter were displayed on state television to promote the government's case that he was taking instructions from the CIA.

On his Instagram account, Mr Perez said he was a police investigator and tactical helicopter pilot whose true passion was his country. In 2015, he directed and starred in a film called “Suspended Death” and several cinematic-like photos show him in fatigues bearing assault rifles, sky diving and standing in action poses with a dog by his side.

Though Mr Perez posted the video on social media claiming the attack represented a coalition of security and civilian officials rising up against “tyranny” before the attack, there was no evidence of deeper support.

The attack fed a conspiracy theory by opposition supporters that it may have been a government setup and overshadowed other drama on Tuesday, including the besieging of opposition legislators by gangs in the National Assembly.

The helicopter raid also coincided with a judicial measure weakening the powers of dissident chief state prosecutor Luisa Ortega, who has emerged as a major challenger to Mr Maduro.

Around the time of the attack, the pro-government Supreme Court expanded the role of the state ombudsman, a human rights guarantor who is closely allied with Maduro, by giving him powers previously held only by the state prosecutor's office.

Tarek Saab can now lead criminal investigations by ordering state officials to conduct autopsies and carry out ballistics tests, powers previously reserved for state prosecutors.

Opposition leaders described that as an attempt to supplant Ms Ortega

“It seems like a movie,” Julio Borges, leader of the opposition-controlled legislature, said of the helicopter raid.

“Some people say it is a set-up, some that it is real ... Yesterday was full of contradictions ... A thousand things are happening, but I summarize it like this: a government is decaying and rotting, while a nation is fighting for dignity.”

Interior Minister Nestor Reverol, appearing alongside police chiefs, said the attack was the work of a few individuals and did not represent the views of the rest of “this noble body.”

Foreign Minister Samuel Moncada complained at a news conference about the lack of international condemnation for the helicopter attack in Caracas, saying it contrasted with the barrage of foreign criticism of the government.

“In Europe it's now eight at night, but we've not had any reaction from European Union countries,” he said of a bloc that has been strongly critical of Maduro in recent months.

The minister rejected accusations that the attack was carried out by the government for its own purposes.

“Who can believe we are that sophisticated? Sending someone to throw grenades, who can believe that?” he asked.