Caracas, July 14 (RHC)-- Thousands of people took to the streets in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas to protest against a recent United Nations report on the country’s human rights situation.  The mass rally, held in defense of the government of President Nicolas Maduro on Saturday, came after the UN high commissioner of human rights, Michelle Bachelet, published a report on the state of human rights in the Latin American country.

The report accused Venezuelan security forces of extrajudicial executions, torture, enforced disappearances and other rights violations in recent years.  Maduro's supporters in Caracas, holding banners and chanting slogans against Bachelet, rejected her report as biased, manipulated and pro-imperialist.

The protesters also said the UN official had betrayed Venezuelans and other Latin American people by issuing such a report.

Last month, Bachelet visited Venezuela and met with Maduro and opposition leader Juan Guaido before the release of the report.  The report claims that Maduro’s government and its affiliated institutions have set in place a strategy “focused on neutralizing, repressing and criminalizing the political opposition and those who criticize the government” since 2016.

Maduro has slammed the latest UN report on his country’s human rights situation as full of “lies”. Bachelet, he said, "presented a report plagued by false statements, misrepresentations and mishandling of data and sources.”