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Dozens of people have been arrested in the past few hours for participating in “criminal” and “terrorist” actions in Venezuela after the presidential elections on July 28, President Nicolas Maduro announced this Monday, blaming the opposition majority for these events.

“We have witnessed a series of events (…) brutal attacks, can be called criminals, terrorists (…) several dozen of these people were caught red-handed,” said Maduro, who was proclaimed re-elected president this Monday by the National Electoral Council (CNE).

The Chavista leader, in power since 2013, said 80% of those detained “have criminal records” and some of them, he said, returned to the country on deportation flights from the United States, but he did not identify them or provide further details.

Moreover, he continued, almost 90% “have two characteristics: “They are in an advanced stage of drug addiction and are armed.”

“I call for the strongest possible response to these criminal acts. “made by special forces criminals”” Maduro said, referring to citizen groups linked to the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), the main opposition bloc, a sector he accused of having a plan to “destabilize Venezuela again.”

Among the actions condemned by Maduro are: Attacks occurred at “hundreds” of more than 15,000 polling stations sanctioned elections, the destruction of “electoral materials”, the burning of “town halls” and attacks on members of the National Armed Forces and agents of the Bolivarian National Police (PNB), complaints that the authorities did not make on Sunday, election day, when they assured that the day had passed without incident.

According to the government, At least 23 servicemen were injured. “some with firearms, victims of violent acts” this Monday, when thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets of Caracas and several regions of the country to protest against actions that in some of them were repressed by the military and police

Agency EFE established that members of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB, paramilitary police) and the Bolivarian National Police They used tear gas and pellets. against protesters who protested peacefully in the Caracas area before the troops arrived, and about twenty of them were arrested.