World Briefing | The Americas

By REUTERS

A farmer, Franklin Brito, 49, has died in a hunger strike to protest President Hugo Chavez’s land nationalization policies. his family said Tuesday. Mr. Brito died Monday in a Caracas military hospital where he had been taken against his will. His death occurred just weeks before a national election on Sept. 26, in which the opposition hopes to slash the majority of Mr. Chavez’s Socialist Party. The government had said that Mr. Brito was mentally unstable and had rejected an offer to return his land. His family accused the government of not giving Mr. Brito the medical care he had sought.