2 killed as wave of looting spreads across Argentina

PanARMENIAN.Net - Two people have been killed in Argentina's third city, Rosario, as a wave of looting spreads, BBC News reported.

Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to stop hundreds of people attacking a supermarket on the outskirts of the capital, Buenos Aires.

There have been other incidents in the central city of Rosario and in the northern province of Chaco. The looting began in the south on Thursday, December 20. The government says trade unions linked to the opposition are to blame.

Argentine television showed images of people - many of them with their faces covered - throwing stones at the police and trying to break into shops and supermarkets.

The attacks stir memories of the violence witnessed during Argentina's economic crisis in 2001 when unemployed people stormed supermarkets.

But National Security Secretary, Sergio Berni, said the looters this time had been taking plasma televisions and stereos, not food and had not been driven by poverty.

At least three supermarkets were looted there on Thursday by more than 100 people, who left with electronics, toys, clothes and food.

Further attacks were reported in the industrial cities of Campana and Zarate, in Buenos Aires province, in Resistencia in the north and outside a Carrefour supermarket in San Fernando, on the outskirts of the capital.