Venezuela leader's foes levy new sanctions and fresh strike

CARACAS, Venezuela -- Opponents of President Nicolas Maduro at home and abroad tried again Wednesday to pressure the socialist leader into halting his plans to rewrite Venezuela's constitution, though there was no public sign their efforts were working.

The Trump administration announced sanctions on 13 current and former members of Maduro's administration, freezing their U.S. assets and barring Americans from doing business with them. The U.S. also joined with a dozen other regional governments in urging Maduro to suspend Sunday's election of a national assembly for rewriting the charter.

The Venezuelan leader appeared emboldened by the sanctions, praising those accused by the U.S. government of undermining the nation's democracy and abusing human rights.

"We don't recognize any sanction," he said. "For us, it's a recognition of morality, loyalty to the nation and civic honesty."

Those moves came as a coalition of Venezuelan opposition groups organized a second national strike in a week. Highways were mostly empty, and businesses shuttered across the country as millions of people observed the 48-hour strike. Activists threw up roadblocks in many neighborhoods to keep others from getting to work.

By late afternoon, clashes between police and protesters erupted at some roadblocks in Caracas, and the chief prosecutor's office reported at least one person killed. That increased the official count of dead in nearly four months of demonstrations to at least 98.

Venezuela was less than four days from a vote that would start the process of rewriting its constitution by electing members of a special assembly to reshape the charter. The opposition is boycotting the vote, saying election rules were rigged to guarantee Maduro a majority in the constitutional assembly.

Maduro did not address the nation Wednesday, but state-run television was filled with scenes of his backers exhorting the public to go to the polls Sunday.

Meanwhile, opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez called on Venezuelans to support the strike in his first direct public message since being moved from prison to house arrest this month.

The 46-year-old former Caracas-area mayor, who was sentenced to 14 years in 2015 after being convicted of inciting violence during a previous spate of protests, also appealed to the military not to deploy for Sunday's election.

"We are on the brink of their trying to annihilate the republic that you swore to defend," Lopez said in a 15-minute video message. "I ask you not to be accomplices in the annihilation of the republic."

Three days of protests are planned leading up to Sunday's vote.