Calm has returned to Bolivia’s capital after troops led by a top general stormed the presidential palace, then quickly retreated.The nation of 12 million watched in shock and bewilderment on Wednesday as Bolivian military forces appeared to turn on the government of President Luis Arce, seizing control of the capital’s main square with armoured personnel carriers, crashing a tank into the palace and unleashing tear gas on protesters who flooded the streets.
Hundreds of Mr Arce’s supporters rushed to the square outside the palace, waving Bolivian flags, singing the national anthem and cheering. The short-lived rebellion followed months of mounting tensions between Mr Arce and his one-time ally, former president Evo Morales. The turmoil began earlier this week, Mr Novillo said, when Mr Arce dismissed Gen Zuniga in a private meeting on Tuesday over the army chief’s threats to arrest Mr Morales if he proceeded with his presidential bid in 2025. In their meeting, Mr Novillo said that Gen Zuniga gave officials no indication he was preparing to seize power.
Members of the country’s fragmented opposition, which Gen Zuniga claimed to support, rejected the coup before it was clear it had failed. “The president told me: ‘The situation is very screwed up, very critical. It is necessary to prepare something to raise my popularity’,” Gen Zuniga quoted the Bolivian leader as saying.
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