Star Metro - Police, protesters clash in Bolivia at road blockade

A month of demonstrations calling for the center-right Paz to step down have paralyzed the Andean nation, with some 100 protest blockades around the country causing severe food and medicine shortages in major cities.

On Saturday, dozens of anti-riot police backed by military vehicles fired tear gas as they attempted to clear a road in the town of San Julian, an AFP correspondent witnessed.

The Santa Cruz region is an agricultural breadbasket for Bolivia, supplying food to the country's western areas.

Demonstrators threw stones and burned tires to try to halt the police's advance, according to the reporter and local television footage.

The road was eventually partially cleared, but protesters moved to block it again. Local media reported that one officer had been wounded.

The incident came one day after police and soldiers cleared a key road linking La Paz to farming communities.

The US-backed, pro-business Paz took office in November promising to resolve the country's worst economic crisis in decades, but his unpopular economic reforms and failure to respond to social demands have roused public ire.

He has repeatedly called for dialogue with protesters but on Wednesday announced a bill to declare a state of emergency, which would authorize military deployment to crack down and clear the blockades.

Congress is debating the measure.

Supplies are running low in La Paz, El Alto, as well as the cities of Cochabamba, Oruro and Potosi.

The government accuses former socialist president Evo Morales -- in hiding from charges related to his relationship with a teen with whom he allegedly fathered a child -- of fomenting the unrest.

On Friday, US President Donald Trump's new Shield of the Americas alliance -- an anti-cartel coalition that includes pro-US administrations in Argentina, Bolivia and Chile among other countries -- gave Paz its unequivocal backing.

T. MacDonald--SMC