ONE of Hugo Chávez’s lesser-known feats since taking over as Venezuela’s leader in 1999 is to have presided over a tripling of the annual homicide rate—and that’s according to the official statistics.*
Last year more than 13,000 people were killed in a country of 27m, producing a murder rate of 48 per 100,000, the second highest in the world (after El Salvador).
In neighbouring Colombia, a country plagued by guerrilla war and drug violence, the rate was 40 per 100,000.
The good news, I suppose, is...
...it could always be worse....
