Bolivia’s government says ex-president Morales shot at anti-narcotics patrol

LA PAZ – The Bolivian government on Monday denied accusations that it led a targeted attack on ex-President Evo Morales, whose car was shot at on Sunday, claiming that the former leader’s convoy had fired at special anti-narcotics police conducting a patrol . .

Morales claims the government had tried to kill him when bullets struck his car in the early hours of Sunday, marking a new chapter of tensions in the Andean country between Morales and former ally President Luis Arce.

Interior Minister Eduardo del Castillo said at a news conference that the FELCN anti-drug unit was conducting a standard highway patrol when Morales’ convoy fired at police and ran over an officer.

Morales had said in a radio interview on Sunday that he had indeed fired back at police after they opened fire.

According to the government, Morales’ vehicles were suspected of transporting drugs.

Morales called false allegations that authorities were carrying out an anti-drug trafficking operation.

“If that were the case, why did your elite military and police team fire more than eighteen times at the vehicles I was traveling in?” he wrote on X.

Del Castillo added that Morales ordered his vehicles burned after the collision, destroying all evidence before it could be collected.

“If he had actually been the victim of an assassination attempt, it would have been in his best interest to leave them intact” so investigators could search them to collect evidence, del Castillo said. REUTERS