Powerful Venezuelan assembly to open

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is heading toward a showdown with his political foes, promising to seat a new constituent assembly today that will rewrite the country's constitution and hold powers that override all other government branches. Leaders of the opposition urged Venezuelans to fill the streets of the capital today, hoping to provide a strong showing that many people object to the assembly. The body's 545 delegates were expected to be installed at the legislative palace in a room just yards from the chamber where the opposition-controlled National Assembly meets. Maduro, who has said he will use the assembly to punish his opponents, planned to attend the opening session. The legislature building has been the scene of bloody clashes in recent weeks and the installation of the all-powerful assembly will intensify a political struggle that has brought three months of bloody anti-government protests to Venezuela. Maduro vows the assembly will strip opposition lawmakers of their constitutional immunity from prosecution, while members of congress say they will only be removed by force. "The only way they'll get us out of here is by killing us," declared Freddy Guevara, the National Assembly's first vice president. "They will never have the seat that the people of Venezuela gave us." The opposition boycotted Sunday's election of the constituent assembly, arguing the rules were rigged to benefit the government, and nearly all the candidates were supporters of Maduro's administration. The election has come under mounting scrutiny since the CEO of an international voting technology company said that "without any doubt" the official voter turnout number had been tampered with — a charge Maduro and the National Electoral Council have dismissed. An increasing number of foreign governments have refused to recognize the assembly and many within Venezuela fear it will create a one-party state. "There has been a gradual erosion of democratic practice and this is a significant line that has been crossed," said Michael Shifter, president of the Washington-based think tank Inter-American Dialogue. "To attach the term democracy to Venezuela with this new constituent assembly is on very weak ground." The U.S. State Department called the assembly illegitimate Thursday, saying the election was rigged to further entrench "the Maduro dictatorship."