CARACAS, Venezuela - The director of a medical center in Venezuela's capital says doctors are treating 50 patients injured during street skirmishes.

Salud Chacao director Maggia Santi said Tuesday that 30 of those injured were shot with rubber bullets. Another 16 sustained bodily trauma, three reported difficulty breathing and one was shot with a firearm.

She said doctors have sufficient supplies to treat the injured, in part due to recent donations by organizations including the Red Cross.

Protesters are clashing with forces loyal to President Nicolás Maduro after opposition leader Juan Guaidó called for a military uprising and mass demonstration.

The individual injured by gunfire is reported to be stable. The protests continued after Leopoldo López, the leader of the opposition, found refuge at the Chilean diplomatic residence in Caracas.

Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. </s> Injured demonstrators take cover at the Colombian border

Injured demonstrators take cover at the Colombian border

AT LEAST TWO people have died after an attempt to get humanitarian aid into Venezuela descended into deadly chaos as President Nicolas Maduro’s security forces fired on demonstrators.

The clashes with security forces left more than 300 people wounded at various border crossings.

The country is gripped by a humanitarian crisis that has seen poverty soar during a prolonged recession and hyperinflation.

Despite a blockade by Maduro, opposition leader Juan Guaido had set yesterday as a deadline for the delivery of food and medical aid stockpiled in Colombia and Brazil. Aid is also being held on the Caribbean island of Curacao.

Humanitarian aid has become the centerpiece of the standoff between Maduro and Guaido, the 35-year-old leader of Venezuela’s National Assembly who declared himself interim president exactly one month ago.

Demonstrators throw stones at the international bridge at Cucuta Source: Rafael Hernandez/dpa via PA Images

Since dawn, protesters in the border towns of Urena and San Antonio were held at bay by the Venezuelan National Guard firing tear gas and rubber bullets.

Gunshots could be heard in the streets of Urena during hours of rioting.

Civil defence officials in Colombia said at least 285 people had been injured in clashes at border bridge crossings. Colombia also ordered aid trucks to return from the border after the violence.

Most were Venezuelan nationals who were trying to cross with aid parcels when they were pushed back by Venezuelan forces.

The most serious incident came hundreds of kilometres away, at a crossing point on the southern border with Brazil where the killings took place. A 14-year-old boy was among those killed.

Another 31 people were wounded when troops blocking the entry of aid opened fire on civilians hoping to collect it, according to rights group Foro Penal.

Officers of the Venezuela's Bolivarian National Police take cover behind their shields, from a shower of rocks Source: Fernando Vergara via PA Images

Guaido, who was in Cucuta, Colombia coordinating the aid operation, told reporters:

Maduro’s supporters set on fire two trucks loaded with aid driven through barricades on a border bridge.

Another two trucks carrying aid sent by Brazil to Venezuela returned to a Brazilian city after Venezuelan troops barred them from crossing for several hours.

Demonstrators push a bus that was torched during clashes with the Bolivarian National Guard in Urena, Venezuela Source: AP/PA Images

A number of National Guard troops took advantage of the chaos and abandoned their posts to cross into Colombia.

At least 60 members of the armed forces had deserted the “Maduro dictatorship” by last night, according to Colombia’s immigration service.

Guaido, who has been recognised as interim leader by more than 50 countries, said they would be welcomed and not treated as traitors.

Yesterday, Guaido formally launched a long-planned distribution operation at a warehouse at the Tienditas border bridge in Cucuta.

Guaido had vowed humanitarian aid would enter his country despite the blockade.

Juan Guaido speaking at an event on Wednesday Source: Boris Vergara/dpa via PA Images

Socialist leader Maduro has rejected the aid, which he’s dismissed as a show and pretext for a US invasion.

Angered by Colombia’s support for Guaido, Maduro announced Venezuela was severing diplomatic ties with Bogota, and gave Colombian diplomats 24 hours to leave the country.

He told a rally of his supporters in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas:

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said the US “will take action” as be condemned the violence.

As many as 300,000 Venezuelans are in dire need of food and medicine after years of shortages and malnutrition, according to Guaido, who has accused Maduro of rigging his re-election and is demanding a new vote. </s> CARACAS, VENEZUELA—Thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets in wealthy eastern Caracas Thursday amid a tropical downpour to support a protest movement that is gaining steam even as it turns more deadly.

Venezuela officials confirmed earlier in the day that a fifth person had died in the wave of anti-government protests now entering its third week.

The public prosecutor’s office says it will investigate the death of 36-year-old Miguel Colmenares. He was shot at a protest in the central city of Barquisimeto on Tuesday.

Read more:Venezuelans rally to oppose President Maduro as officials attempt to break up crowd

Gruseny Calderon was killed during the same protest. Congressman Alfonso Marquina says the 32-year-old protester was injured by rubber bullets that pierced his lung and liver. </s> The standoff for humanitarian aid for Venezuela turned deadly Friday when a woman of an indigenous group was killed and another dozen injured after clashes with security forces at a border town with Brazil.

The victim was identified as Zoraida Rodriguez, a member of the Pemon ethnic group that clashed with the Venezuela National Guard and army, who were moving tanks near the border town of Gran Sabana, Mayor Emiliano Gonzalez said.

Gonzalez said that while soldiers fired rubber bullets and tear gas, Rodriguez was shot dead during the clashes. The injured people were taken for medical treatment.

There was no immediate information on the condition of the injured, though television news showed images of three men on gurneys being treated for bloody wounds.

GUAIDO'S TRUCKS CLASH WITH MADURO'S MILITARY IN ATTEMPT TO FORCE AID INTO VENEZUELA

The violence came a day after embattled President Nicolas Maduro ordered the border with Brazil closed to prevent aid from neighboring countries to enter Venezuela. He also blocked air and sea travel between Venezuela and the nearby Dutch Caribbean island of Curacao, where the first cargo of relief supplies arrived earlier that day.

Maduro denies any humanitarian crisis exists, and the plan to bring in aid is one of the most ambitious — and potentially dangerous — the opposition has attempted since opposition leader Juan Guaido declared himself interim president in January.

"We're not beggars," he said. "What the U.S. empire is doing with its puppets is an internal provocation. They wanted to generate a great national commotion, but they didn't achieve it."

US SAYS IT WILL DELIVER AID BLOCKED BY VENEZUELA, SETTING UP CONFRONTATION WITH MADURO REGIME

The deadly clashes were not the only to turn violent in Venezuela over humanitarian aid.

Trucks driven by Guaido supporters nearly rammed into a blockade by security forces in an attempt to reach aid in Colombia.

Images showed a red truck trying to forcefully pass through a checkpoint in Mariara, in northern Venezuela a few hours outside of Caracas, on Thursday as the security forces appeared to stand their ground.

The national guardsmen in anti-riot gear positioned a trailer truck in front of a tunnel, blocking the highway westward. A shouting match and scuffle ensured, with the guardsmen firing tear cag before the lawmakers eventually forced their way through and resumed their journey.

VENEZUELA TO CLOSE BORDER WITH BRAZIL AMID MADURO'S REFUSAL OF HUMANITARIAN AID

The truck is part of a cross-country caravan led by Guiado for the border with Colombia, where much of the U.S.-supplied aid is warehoused. Guaido has called for thousands of ordinary Venezuelans to assemble at the Colombian border on Saturday to help bring the aid across.

Meanwhile, dueling concerts began on the country's western border with Colombia, where much of the U.S.-supplied aid is being stored in a warehouse.

British billionaire and adventurer Richard Branson is sponsoring a Live Aid-style concert featuring dozens of musicians including Latin rock star Juanes on one side of a crossing that Colombian officials have renamed the "Unity Bridge," while Maduro's socialist government is promising a three-day festival deemed "Hands Off Venezuela" on the other.

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The Trump administration said it's sent nearly 200 metric tons of humanitarian assistance over the past two weeks to the Colombian-Venezuelan border for distribution inside Venezuela.

The U.S. Agency for International Development said Friday that about 191 tons of relief supplies have been delivered to a depot in Cucuta, Colombia since Feb. 4. That includes food for 2,000 people for a month and medical material such as hygiene kits, wheelchairs, crutches, bandages, and examination gloves.

The Associated Press contributed to this report </s> Caracas, June 28 Armed civilian groups have attacked the Venezuelan Parliament building after a clash between lawmakers and the military police of the Bolivarian National Guard , opposition legislator Julio Borges has said. "Different lawmakers and Assembly personnel saw officers entering with boxes from the National Election Council and a clash occurred there between the GNB officers and the lawmakers," Borges said.

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An armored car runs over supporters of Guaidó, escalating violence. At least 71 injured people, including two with gunshot wounds, were taken to Salud Chacao Medical Center in Caracas, according to the president of the center.